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Giants' fizzling lineup continues to struggle vs. fastball as strikeouts pile up originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

SAN FRANCISCO — The Giants had a clear approach to the MLB draft this year, and that continued at the trade deadline. At every turn, they are trying to add hitters who are into bat control and limit strikeouts. 

It will take a while, though, to change the makeup of the big league roster, and right now this is a group that’s big on swing-and-miss. It’s a major reason why their season has spiraled in recent weeks. 

The lineup struck out 12 times in Tuesday’s 5-1 loss to the San Diego Padres, reaching double-digits for a fifth consecutive game and the eighth time in the last nine games. They have exactly 100 strikeouts over those nine games, and it’s not because they’re working deep counts or playing a “three true outcomes” brand of baseball. They have 16 walks during that span.

Manager Bob Melvin found it jarring last Monday when Yu Darvish opened his night with nine consecutive fastballs. The trend has continued, and thus far, the Giants haven’t found an answer.

Asked about it late Tuesday night, Melvin pointed out that the lineup is without Matt Chapman, who has the highest walk rate of any of the regulars who have been here all year. The Giants also traded away Mike Yastrzemski, who struck out a fair amount, but countered that by drawing plenty of walks. 

With Yastrzemski gone and Chapman (hand) and Willy Adames (side soreness) both out Tuesday, Melvin had just one player (Rafael Devers) in his lineup who has walked in more than 9 percent of his at-bats this season. 

“It’s a little bit different in the personnel right now,” Melvin said. “We’re trying to catch up to some fastballs and get ahead a little bit earlier and you try to hit the fastball. So it doesn’t look as good as far as the walks go.”

For a team that is trying to adjust on the fly, Nick Pivetta was just about the exact opposite of who they needed to see on the mound Tuesday. The right-hander has tremendous carry on his fastball and gets good extension. His four-seamer ranks as the second-best in the big leagues by Run Value, and he used it 48 times Tuesday. Six of his 10 strikeouts came on a fastball.

The Giants once hoped to use these two August series against the Padres as a way to get back into the MLB playoff race. Instead, they’ve dropped four of five to the division rival, striking out 50 times.

“This team does have a lot of guys that throw hard, and they throw at the top of the zone and they know where the top is,” Melvin said. “That’s something we have to solve, is when you go after it up there and when you don’t. [It was] 24 vert today from Pivetta — I don’t know that I’ve seen that before. We’ve seen some 21s, 22s … It looks good at certain levels, and when you have that kind of vertical [break] it’s easier said than done to stay on top of it and get it.”

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If there was any chance of the Yankees seeing Jonathan Loáisiga return to their bullpen before the end of August, it's been completely erased now.

Prior to Wednesday's road meeting with the Rays, manager Aaron Boonerevealed to the media that the veteran right-hander "probably" has a flexor strain, as he underwent tests on Tuesday after reporting soreness in his right elbow/triceps area. 

The Yankees are still gathering additional opinions.

The arm issue arrived just two days after Loáisiga began his rehab assignment with Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, recovering from back stiffness.

While the severity of Loáisiga's suspected flexor strain remains unclear, the setback can be added to his laundry list of poor injury luck. Before joining the injured list on Aug. 3, the 30-year-old had posted an unreliable 4.25 ERA and 1.48 WHIP with 25 strikeouts across 29.2 innings (30 games).

Loáisiga's rehab appearance in Triple-A last weekend was adequate -- he struck out one while allowing one hit and one walk in one scoreless frame. At this time, there's no telling whether he'll make his way back into the big-league mix this season.

The Yankees also dealt with another bullpen issue on Tuesday, as they placed lefty reliever Brent Headrick on the 15-day injured list with a left forearm contusion.

The Mets placed everyday catcher Francisco Alvarez on the IL with a thumb sprain, which could impact his availability for the rest of the season.

While the team will have to wait and see if Alvarez will need season-ending surgery, they are prepared to lean on Luis Torrens and recently-recalled backstop Hayden Senger to pick up the slack. 

But it won't be easy.

Since returning from his demotion in late July, Alvarez was slashing .323/.408/.645 with four homers, six doubles, one triple, 13 RBI, and 14 runs scored in 71 plate appearances over 21 games. The 23-year-old was hitting his stride offensively, and now Torrens will look to give the Mets some offense out of that spot in the lineup.

"It’s been tough for him the last couple of months, especially when Alvy was down, and he got to play every day, but he’s a good player," manager Carlos Mendoza said of Torrens. "He showed it last year when we first acquired him. He was a big part of this team, him and Senger both, when we were winning a lot of games, and we’ll need those guys to step up now."

This season, Torrens is slashing .214/.280/.301 with an OPS of .581, but was solid for the Mets when Alvarez started the year on the IL. He batted .258 with a home run and 10 RBI in 22 games (16 starts) in March/April and .300 in 12 games (10 starts) in split time with Alvarez. 

But he has struggled the last three months, hitting .135, .200 and .167. 

When asked if there's a way Torrens can improve offensively, Mendoza gave his opinion on what his catcher needs to do.

"Just continue to believe in the work because he’s a good player. Not trying to do too much," he said. "Get good pitches, be aggressive and use the whole field. Again, just being yourself and trying not to do too much."

Senger, who has played in just 21 games this year, is slashing .174/.208/.196 with an OPS of .404. How much production the Mets get from their catcher's spot will be something to monitor as they determine whether Alvarez can or should return before the end of the regular season.

Mookie Betts was back at shortstop and Teoscar Hernández remained in right field for the Dodgers on Tuesday, a day after two questionable fielding plays in the outfield led to two runs in a 4-3 walk-off loss to the last-place Colorado Rockies.

Hernández’s defense has increasingly become a matter of concern for manager Dave Roberts and Monday’s loss was followed by a meeting involving Roberts; Andrew Friedman, the Dodgers president of baseball operations; and Betts, who has expressed a willingness to move back to right field where he was a six-time Gold Glove winner.

Hernández is ranked 64^th among National League right fielders with a defensive WAR of -0.4 and his two errors are tied for fourth-most in the league.

Tonight's #Dodgers lineup at Rockies: pic.twitter.com/KOeJmJSKgT

— Los Angeles Dodgers (@Dodgers) August 19, 2025

“He's got to get better out there. There's just no way to put it,” Roberts said after Monday's game of Hernández. “It's not a lack of effort. But, you know, we’ve just got to kind of get better. We do.”

Betts, meanwhile, twice led the American League in fielding average and putouts as the Boston Red Sox’s right fielder. But he’s played shortstop full-time this season.

“Defense is a big part of postseason baseball and winning baseball,” Roberts said.

Betts’ move to the infield has arguably weakened the Dodgers in two ways: Hernández’s defense and Betts’ offense. Playing the infield, especially shortstop, is far more taxing mentally than playing in the outfield and Betts is slashing a career-low .242/.312/.370 this season.

Read more:Mookie Betts meets with Dave Roberts, Andrew Friedman after Dodgers' loss to Rockies

Moving Betts back to right field would likely mean using Alex Freeland or Miguel Rojas at shortstop, at least in the short term. Freeland played nearly 300 games at shortstop in the minors while Rojas has played more than 940 games there in the majors.

Hernández, second on the team with 74 RBIs and tied for second with 20 home runs, would then move to left field — a less-demanding position defensively than right field — in place of Michael Conforto, whose .190 batting average is the worst in the majors among players with at least 300 at-bats.

Moving Betts back to the outfield could be easier for Roberts when utility players Tommy Edman, Hyeseong Kim and Kiké Hernández return from the injured list, giving the manager more depth and flexibility. Kim, who will begin a rehab assignment this week, is the furthest along and could be back by early next week.

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

What we learned as Jung Hoo Lee's homer not enough in Giants' loss to Padres originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

• BOX SCORE

SAN FRANCISCO — The Giants kicked off the road trip with three home runs in an inning. Since then, they’ve been as silent offensively as they were on a historically bad homestand. 

In the 17 innings since Wilmer Flores made it 4-0 in the first inning on Monday, they have scored just one run. On Tuesday, that run again came early, but they lost 5-1 to the San Diego Padres, falling another game back of the third wild-card spot that soon will be out of reach. 

Jung Hoo Lee led off the game with his seventh homer of the year, but that was it against Nick Pivetta, who picked up his 13th win and third against the Giants. While Monday’s series opener was a nailbiter, this game fit right in with the three the Padres won at Oracle Park last week. It was never in doubt. 

The Giants have five runs in the first inning in this series. In innings two through nine, they’re 7-for-54 with no runs. 

Those Guys Again? 

Kai-Wei Teng has made eight big league appearances across two seasons and three have come against the Padres, including his debut last year and his last two starts this year. This was a big improvement over last week’s start at Oracle Park, but Teng still ended up getting charged with three earned runs in 3 1/3 innings. Two of the runs came in the fourth, when he hit two of the first four batters. 

Teng leaned heavily on his slider, throwing it 28 times with good success. He got 22 strikes and five whiffs, and three of his four strikeouts came on the pitch. 

Overall, though, he continues to struggle with his command. Through four appearances this year, he has nine walks in 13 1/3 innings. He also has hit three batters. Teng cut his walk rate significantly in Triple-A this year, but that hasn’t translated to the big leagues yet.

Leadoff Lee

The second pitch of the game was a 95 mph fastball that Lee crushed to right-center. It was the lone run off Pivetta and gave the Giants a leadoff homer for a second straight day. The last time they did that was last Sept. 17-18 when Mike Yastrzemski did it twice to the Baltimore Orioles, but before that, you have to dig pretty deep.

The previous back-to-back was in 1985 when Dan Gladden got to the Cincinnati Reds and then Houston Astros on consecutive days. Before that it was Bobby Bonds in 1973. 

Lee and Heliot Ramos, who led off Monday’s game with a homer, became just the second set of Giants to lead off consecutive games with a homer. In 1927, Les Mann led off a game against the Chicago Cubs with a home run and then the great Heinie Mueller did it the next game against the Philadelphia Phillies. 

Concerning Trend

The Giants made Pivetta grind, but it didn’t lead to anything. He threw 108 pitches over six innings, the final one freezing Christian Koss and clinching a double-digit strikeout night. Right now, if you’re trying to get there, the Giants are the team you want to see. 

They hit double-digit strikeouts for the fifth consecutive game and eighth time in their last nine games. Over those nine games — seven of which have been losses — the Giants have 100 strikeouts to just 18 walks. 

Entering the night, the Giants had the sixth-highest strikeout rate in MLB in the second half and ranked 23rd in walk rate. For a team that doesn’t hit a lot of homers and doesn’t hit at all with runners in scoring position, that’s not a great starting point. 

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