According to The Athletic’s Andrew Baggarly, the Giants front office tried to negotiate a trade for Robbie Ray before his scheduled start on Thursday against the Padres. But no Kyle Harrison type deal materialized at the 11th hour, and the veteran southpaw suited up and took the mound with San Francisco stitched across his chest for likely the last time.
For some, this was like tearing a Han Solo, Battle of Hoth collectible action figure out of its original packaging in the midst of an eBay bidding war. There was no benefit for the Giants, or for Ray, to have him pitch against the Padres. His value around the league was already high, especially after posting a 1.67 ERA over his last 9 appearances. Other than grabbing headlines with a no-hitter or perfect game, there wasn’t anything Ray could’ve done to really raise his trade value to contending teams. The risk far out-weighed the rewards.
Luckily, his arm didn’t explode. And there will be some fans that will buy a Robbie Ray Giants jersey on the official MLB shop after his coming trade (heavily discounted, of course), because, amongst the fog of distractions, the veteran took the mound anyway, arm-combustion be damned. As Tony Vitello put it in his pregame presser: “There is the field of speculation, and the field of competing.” The future isn’t guaranteed. Legacies are made in the present. Throwing a baseball isn’t a risk, it’s what got him in this position in the first place.
Right before he strode out onto the field in the 1st, Ray paused on the top step of the dugout and took one long final pull on his signature pre-start cigarillo. He shook out his mane of black hair, pulled the brim of his hat low over his eyes and growled so the whole team could hear: “I’m not a show pony. I’m a workhorse,” before trotting out onto the field.
Ray didn’t throw a no-hitter, nor did he take a line-drive to his throwing elbow. The game went down without incident and as expected considering the 34 year old’s performance over the last two months: 6 innings pitched in which he allowed 1 run on 4 hits while striking out 6. He’s now 6-0 over his last ten games, his slightly lowered 1.65 ERA is the third lowest in the Majors since the beginning of June.
The outing reflected Ray’s shifting approach on the mound. No longer is a grunt-and-heave type power arm, brazenly reliant on strikeouts bagged by his rising four-seamer and hard slider. Ray still grunts, but the heave part has become a little more nuanced. His 35% four-seam usage is the lowest point of his career. What’s filled in the gaps is a change-up and sinker. Those new adaptations, along with his somewhat goofy knuckle curve, were on full-display in San Diego. Of the 86 pitches thrown, only two of them were sliders.
While his strikeouts have fallen (his 21% K-percentage is the lowest it’s been in his entire career), so has his hard-hit rate. Being okay pitching to contact, thanks in part to new pitch-types and heavier options like the sinker and change, has given him another exit route through tough innings. He’s more dynamic and harder for opposing hitters to pin down and box-in.
We saw this in the 2nd inning when the Padres threatened to load the bases with no outs. A wayward four-seam hit Ty France to lead off the frame, then Jackson Merrill followed with an excuse-me bloop single off one of the only sliders thrown. With two on, Ray found himself in a 3-2 count to Luis Campusano. The inning had all the trappings of a Robbie Ray classic: one which would drag on and on, with many deep counts and four-seamers fouled away and away as Ray’s pitch count rises, effectively sinking his chances of pitching through the 5th.
That didn’t happen here. While Ray didn’t use one of his newer offerings, the fact that he had shown Camusano three change-ups and had established his sinker in the zone earlier in the at-bat gave his signature four-seam more of a bite. The Padres’ catcher couldn’t just sit on the pitch. Perhaps if Campusano didn’t have to worry about covering the outside of the plate because of the sinker, or covering the possibility of another change-up, he could’ve turned on the straight fastball and launched it into the bricks of the Western Metal Supply building. Instead, it jammed him and rolled into an inning-changing double play.
Xander Bogaerts still punched in the run anyway by rolling a single away from a shifted infield — but it’d be all the Padres get. A run, but on one pitch. And on one more after that, Ray was out of the inning thanks to Christian Koss’s fine barehanded play on a Jake Croeneworth bunt attempt.
16 pitches in total. That proved to be Ray’s most laborious inning until his final inning of work in the 6th when he threw 20. Knowing that the inning would be his last, Ray wanted to end things as a Giant on his terms. After Luis Rengifo reached second with a one-out double — San Diego’s first and only extra base hit of the night — he shifted into another gear. He worked his way back from a 3-0 count to Manny Machado and got him to swing-through a challenge sinker over the heart of the plate. He then got Ty France helplessly digging after a 1-2 change-up in the dirt.
Runner stranded. Inning over. Outing over. Time as a Giant — most likely over.
Ray was able to take home the win thanks to his battery mate Daniel Susac. After launching his first two career home runs in San Francisco, Susac clearly didn’t want to lose the feeling. A dinger is a dangerous drug. He probably took the red bat he used with him on the plane (“No, no, no, this isn’t a bomb,” he explained to the TSA agent. “It drops them.”), buckling it into the seat next to him, ordering it a complimentary beverage (club soda, please) on the brief flight down to San Diego. They probably spent some quality time together after checking-in at the hotel. A nice dinner in the Gaslamp followed by a moonlit walk along Harbor Drive, talking about everything, and nothing.
By the time the 2nd inning rolled around and Susac’s spot in the order had come up, lefty starter JP Sears didn’t have a chance. A bond had been formed: Danny Susac and his red wooden bat were ready to take on the world. Sears recognized this and understood resistance was futile. “Here, destroy this 93 MPH fastball,” he said, and Susac and his red wooden bat obliged.
That two-run homer was really the only clear offensive statement the Giants could muster in a frustrating game for the line-up.
Opportunities to blow the game open were ripe for the picking, and would ultimately rot on the vine.At least two runners would reach base in 7 of 9 innings. The line-up were 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position, leaving 11 runners stranded.
It wasn’t completely their fault. The game started with Fernando Tatis Jr. rather annoyingly robbing Rafael Devers of a 3-run homer, which is, rather spookily, something he had done before…in San Diego…in the 1st inning…with JP Sears pitching.
Devers had to settle for a sacrifice fly — which became a theme.
After Susac recouped the difference of the Tatis robbery, his sacrifice fly in the 5th was the only other run San Francisco would score. The kid had just 5 RBIs in all of April, 6 in May, and 3 in June — he’s got 7 in the last two games, and three home runs in his last 5 plate appearances.
Four runs were plenty with Ray on the mound.
And I guess, no matter how you think teams should manage trade-chip arms before the deadline, or who had the final decision, one should respect what Ray did: He pitched, and he pitched well, because that’s what he’s paid to do, and he just might like doing it too.
Other guys (*cough* Blake Snell *cough cough*) wouldn’t have.
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COVERS INTEL: Jeffrey Springs allows loud contact (
