PHOENIX — The planned reset for Tyler Fitzgerald lasted just a week, and it wasn’t exactly stress-free. A few days after he returned to Triple-A Sacramento, Fitzgerald got drilled on the left hand, leaving him with an ugly bruise, but no fracture. Fitzgerald considered himself lucky, and on Monday, he found himself back in the big league lineup after Casey Schmitt went on the IL with a more troubling bone bruise.
On his first night back, the Opening Day second baseman hit a pair of doubles, including one that tied the game in the top of the seventh. It was a needed night for a young player who was looking for ways to get his confidence back.
“It felt good to hit the ball hard again,” Fitzgerald said. “I haven’t done that in a while.”
That was the silver lining for the Giants. The rest of this night fit in with the week that Fitzgerald missed, and really, with the last month-plus of baseball.
The Giants lost 4-2 to the Arizona Diamondbacks, falling to 1-6 in this two-week stretch that’s supposed to be the easiest on their schedule. They have scored just seven runs in four games on this road trip, but this goes much deeper.
Over the last 40 games, the lineup has scored more than four runs just 11 times. In nearly half of those games (16), they have scored two runs or fewer.
The frustration is boiling over, and it didn’t help that a potential game-tying rally Monday was possibly harmed by fan interference. A Diamondbacks fan reached over the wall to grab Christian Koss’ double in the eighth, and when a lengthy review left Koss at second, Rafael Devers and Heliot Ramos struck out. The Ramos strikeout — on a ball that was off the plate — set manager Bob Melvin off. He was ejected before the bottom of the ninth.
“Heliot gets the bat taken out of his hands like that for the second time in the game,” Melvin said. “[The catcher] is literally set up underneath his armpit and the ball is off the plate, outside. That’s a tough one. But look, we’re in this position because we’re not scoring enough runs and doing much offensively, so it gets frustrating.”
There are a lot of reasons to be frustrated right now, including the fact that the Giants in many ways wasted one of the best months of Logan Webb’s career. He threw 40 1/3 innings in June and allowed just 10 runs, but the team went 3-3. Webb gave up three runs Monday on a lot of soft contact, but the Giants didn’t give him much support.
A few weeks ago, Webb was asked about the offense’s struggles and pointed out that he’s seen much tougher times. This latest skid, though, is starting to climb the rankings.
“It’s pretty tough,” Webb said. “It’s tough right now, but if we want to go to the places that we want to go to, we have to get through it. We’ve just got to kind of dig deep and show up tomorrow. That’s the only thing we can do.”
The latest loss took place in front of just about the entire front office, but if any changes are coming, they haven’t been telegraphed. Buster Posey has shown a lot of patience this year, and he is said to be exhibiting it now, as well. He had a long talk with hitting coach Pat Burrell before batting practice on Monday, and then he leaned on the rail and watched a team that continues to put the work in every afternoon, but has little to show for it.
Posey already made his big move, acquiring Rafael Devers, but the slugger has an OPS under .700 as a Giant and struck out four times on Monday. The last one came with the tying run on second after the Koss fly ball.
The Giants felt that the ball would have been a double had it not been touched, but it still stung, and not just in the moment. Koss wasn’t going to be able to stretch it even if the ball bounced off the wall, as he had pulled his hamstring earlier in the game. He won’t play Tuesday and there’s a chance he hits the IL.
Already without Matt Chapman, the Giants have lost fill-ins Schmitt and Koss over the past week. It’s bad luck, but all they had to do was look across the field to know that they’ve actually done pretty well in the health department this year. The Diamondbacks lost Corbin Burnes to Tommy John surgery and will play this series without star outfielder Corbin Carroll and catcher Gabriel Moreno. First baseman Josh Naylor was also out of the lineup Monday.
“It happens. It sucks that it happens, but look around baseball and how many guys are going out, especially this part of the year,” Webb said of the latest injury at third base. “That’s why they call it the dog days of summer. It’s tough, but it’s next man up and find a way.”
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