OAKLAND — Jake Peavy turned and walked toward the dugout as a two-out pitch shot straight up toward the sky in the third inning. He had seemingly limited the damage, giving the Giants a small deficit to overcome.
A second later the crowd roared and Peavy turned to his catcher, Trevor Brown.
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“What just happened?” he demanded, a confused look on his face.
Those three words pretty much summed up another hard-to-watch night for the Giants. That ball, a two-out pop-up, was dropped for an error. It was one of a half-dozen defensive miscues for the Giants, some of them on basic plays, that led to a 7-1 loss. The Giants have lost all three games of this series against the A’s, looking bizarrely overmatched at times.
Peavy carried a hot streak into the game and needed just 15 pitches to get through six outs, but the third was a 40-pitch car crash, and little of it was Peavy’s fault. With one out, Marcus Semien hit a pop-up to shallow right that turned into three bases when Ramiro Pena and Mac Williamson collided. The ball trickled away from them and Pena grabbed at a left leg injury that would pull him out of the game in the fifth.
Billy Burns followed with a sacrifice squeeze and Coco Crisp hit a liner to the gap that Angel Pagan misplayed into a triple. Jed Lowrie followed with a high fly down the right field line. Williamson jumped at the wall and got his glove on it, but he couldn’t hold on. Peavy had to waste a few more pitches when Ruben Tejada, on his first night as a Giant, dropped a pop-up with two outs.
San Francisco Giants
Williamson had a chance to make up for that two-run homer in the fourth, when he came up with the bases loaded. He blasted a 3-2 changeup from Sean Manaea down the line, missing a grand slam by about a dozen feet. The next pitch was hit to short for an inning-ending double play.
Pagan was in the middle of a disastrous fourth that had Peavy screaming in frustration. A Yonder Alonso homer had given the A’s a five-run lead, and Marcus Semien got what was originally ruled a triple when Pagan couldn’t track down a fly ball to the wall in left-center. After the game, the official scorer charged Pagan with an error. Burns hit a single to left that turned into two bases when the ball ticked under Pagan’s glove. Peavy was livid, and his night was over a batter later.
Starting pitching report: Peavy deserved much better than his final line. He gave up seven runs, but only three of them were earned.
Bullpen report: A night after they imploded, the relievers allowed just one hit.
At the plate: Brandon Crawford drove in his 50th run.
In the field: Pena stayed down a couple minutes after getting run over by Williamson, who has him by about 40 pounds. He continuously bent over the rest of the inning, and he gave way to Conor Gillaspie in the fifth, with Tejada moving over to second. The Giants already have four infielders on the disabled list.
Attendance: The A’s announced a crowd of 32,810 human beings. It sounded like they turned to sarcastic applause when the Giants finally cleanly fielded a fly ball in the fourth.
Up next: Madison Bumgarner is good at stopping things like this. He’ll try to do it again.