San Francisco Giants News

Despite taking a 1-0 lead into the sixth, the Giants’ pitching staff fell apart in the later innings as San Francisco fell on the road to the Phillies Saturday 5-1. This was the Giants’ eighth lose in their last eleven games.

Ty Blach was excellent for the Giants and received plenty of run support on Friday night in Philadelphia in a 9-0 win over the Phillies. Denard Span collected five hits and Austin Slater had an RBI hit in his MLB debut.

Justin Ruggiano was designated for assignment by the Giants on Friday to make room for the recently promoted Austin Slater. Ruggiano played 19 games and hit .217 for the Giants this season. Slater will make his MLB debut Friday as he is in the starting lineup in Philadelphia.

So the Giants are very close to “sell” mode even if they aren’t saying so right now. The draft is coming up June 12th, Hunter Pence is about to return to the lineup and I think the front office wants to see what happens in the next couple of weeks before pulling the plug.

With their consistent struggles at the plate, the Giants have seemingly decided to try injecting some life into the batting order with a few Triple-A call-ups. After promoting the versatile OF/INF Orlando Calixte on Tuesday, the Giants are bringing up another outfielder in Austin Slater according to Andrew Baggarly of the San Jose Mercury News.

The premise is dumb. The message supposedly sent doesn’t resonate, the execution of the “fight” after the pitch is the equivalent of diamond stud collared chihuahua’s barking at each other from 10 feet away, and the retaliation beaning after is less exciting than a drunk fan on the field being chased by calorically challenged mall cops.

MLB handed down a six game suspension to Hunter Strickland, and a four game suspension to Bryce Harper on Tuesday, following Harper’s charging of the mound that led to a benches clearing brawl on Monday.

Max Scherzer threw a complete game on Wednesday night as the Nationals completed their sweep of the Giants. San Francisco got just five hits in the game. Matt Cain allowed two earned runs in five innings.

SAN FRANCISCO – While neither Bryce Harper nor Hunter Strickland were injured in their skirmish Monday, there was a casualty on a field in Giants’ first-baseman Michael Morse.

SAN FRANCISCO – On a night with not much to cheer for if you’re a Giants fan, recent call-up OF Orlando Calixte was a bright spot on the evening. Calixte was brought-up to replace outfielder Mac Williamson and was impressive in his debut with the Giants. He went two for five, with an RBI double in the second inning and had his first major-league hit with a single off of the very first pitch he saw from Nationals’ starter Gio Gonzalez.