San Francisco Giants Continuing Their Free Fall

Injuries and uncharacteristic struggles from key personnel doomed the San Francisco Giants season.

For the San Francisco Giants, a team whose recent history of achievement matched their expectations, the summer of 2017 is likely to be forgotten in a hurry.

Aligned with the Los Angeles Dodgers to challenge for National League West honors, the Giants broke out of the gate with a walk-off loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks on April 2, and the road has been rough, turbulent and tempestuous.

Coming into Saturday’s game with Arizona at home, the Giants were 42-69, but dropped their 69^th game last season on Sept. 17. With less than two months remaining in the season, manager Bruce Bochy is toying with the idea of cleaning house and give prospects an opportunity.

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In the series with the Diamondbacks over the recent weekend, there was evidence of Bochy’s direction. First, righty Matt Cain, considered a starter for San Francisco since the end of the 2005 season, was dumped from a scheduled start in favor of right-hander Chris Stratton. In only his second major league start Saturday, Stratton was shaky at best, but managed to escape several times. His status in the rotation remains uncertain.

Then, there’s the curious of case of George Kontos, who was placed on waivers late Friday night, and immediately claimed by the Pittsburgh Pirates. In 50 appearances for the Giants in 2017, Kontos was 0-5, but sported a reasonable 3.83 ERA. All of which prompted Bochy to explain to Call to the Pen before Saturday’s game with the Diamondbacks that auditions are underway for the 2018 season.

“We want to see what young players can so,” he said. “This gives us an opportunity to see what needs to be done this winter. Gives us an idea of what we have.”

What the Giants have, and experienced this dreadful season, is a plethora of injuries. Beginning with All-Star Madison Bumgarner missing three months due to that dirt bike accident, the injures seem to accelerate like an avalanche.

First, Brandon Crawford missed 14 games because of right groin strain. Conor Gillaspie experienced two visits to the disabled list with back spasms. Ryder Jones hit the DL with right wrist contusion. Mark Melanson went down with a mild right pronator strain. Jarrett Parker experienced a fractured right clavicle. Hunter Pence suffered a left hamstring sprain. Buster Posey went down with concussion symptoms. Denard Span with out with sternoclavicular joint sprain. Stratton landed on the DL with a right calf strain. Michael Morse suffered a concussion. Brandon Belt landed on Major League Baseball’s seven-day DL with a concussion Will Smith is out indefinitely with Tommy John surgery. Trevor Brown suffered a sprained right ankle, and Johnny Cueto is currently on the DL with blisters on his pitching hand.

Plus, off season performances from those counted upon clearly compromised this season. Save Posey, hitting .326 coming into Saturday’s game, the next highest batting average, among everyday players, belonged to Span at .273. Before Pence’s two-run homer in the seventh inning Saturday off Diamondbacks’ right-hander Taijuan Walker, the Giants went 242 consecutive times at-bat against Arizona pitchers without hitting a home run in AT&T Park. That was the longest active streak of any team in the majors.

All of which has clearly marginalized the Giants season.

From an October discussion with the Los Angeles Dodgers to now establishing tee times, the Giants represent the kind of fall from grace which teams loathe. Still, the combination of a fractured staff, no viable closer and players experiencing down seasons have interacted to place the Giants season in total decline.

While Bochy told Call to the Pen of his intentions to look at some players and give a lesser role to others, he discounts tapping into the minor leagues.

“We’ll look at what is here,” he said. “No, I’m not ready to start pulling players from Triple-AAA. I want to see we are in September.”

Next: Top farm systems after the deadline

The magic mirror will not likely hold any distortions. The present-day Giants are not likely to be marginally or quantitatively different after Labor Day than what Bochy sees in front of him right now.