Stretch run: the Giants bow out

It's been a long September

Sep 20, 2023

With less than two weeks left in the regular season and few tight playoff races playing out, I thought I’d tune in to recap some key themes from a key game (or a few). The theme in this one: age, and how it may have sunk the Giants’ season.

The Matchup: Giants @ Diamondbacks

Five days ago, these teams were neck-and-neck in the hunt. On September 15th FanGraphs put Arizona’s chance of securing a playoff spot at 37% and San Francisco’s at 31%. Then the Giants lost three of four in Colorado. Their playoff number slipped to 13%, and this two-game set with Arizona became the decider.

Rotations were shuffled on both sides to make last night’s matchup a premier billing: Alex Cobb and Zac Gallen. This was also a clash of youth against experience. The lineups:

There’s a certain energy that 22- and 23-year-old players create. This is a young Diamondbacks team that would run down balls in the outfield and take bases on the infield. They showed the kind of play that people love to watch and to write about - but also the kind that surpasses cliché and actually makes a difference in games.

This Giants lineup, on the other hand, looked like it had just played 4 games in 3 days at altitude in Denver. It’s anchored by players who are attempting not to slide down the back side of the aging curve. It showed last night.

Let’s get into it.

Setting the tone

San Francisco opens up with a Wade Jr. triple and a Joc blast (a 3-2 Gallen breaking ball that hung up just a bit). It’s a quick 2-0 lead. But hold on: the Giants haven’t played defense yet.

Here’s Arizona’s counter in the bottom-half of the first:

Corbin Carroll: base hit through the 5-6 hole
Ketel Marte: base hit through the 3-4 hole
- Carroll goes 1st to 3rd. He touches the 2nd base bag before Michael Conforto picks up the ball.

Tommy Pham: ground ball to 2nd. Thairo Estrada waits for the big hop. Carroll scores. Marte is forced out at 2nd - barely:

Cobb gets two more groundouts to end the frame. He doesn’t let a ball reach the outfield in the air, but has to deal with some traffic anyway. 2-1 San Francisco.

On to the 2nd Inning

Zac Gallen starts to settle in and strikes out the side. Haniger and Bailey go down looking (Gallen set down five Giants on called third strikes). Bailey sees five pitches - all fastballs. He swings at none. Here’s the heater he goes down on:

With that take, we can only imagine Bailey was looking for something else.

Brandon Crawford sees three pitches (no fastballs). He swings at every one:

Crawford’s swings reflect a disconnect between mind and body that can appear with age. The first two swings reflect a lack of pitch recognition: Crawford sees fastball and gets curveball (left) and changeup (middle). In the last frame, Crawford sees the spin and tries to stop himself, but can’t.

Let’s move to Arizona’s half and continue to press the theme. Here’s a Geraldo Perdomo excuse-me double that a younger Mitch Haniger might try to catch instead of corral:

Carroll piles on by making Haniger work even harder out in left field. He smacks a ground ball down the left field line and is standing on 2nd base doing his party signal to the dugout before the ball is thrown back to the infield:

Then this happens:

First, a Carroll stolen base. The throw beats him to 3rd, but Flores’ glove doesn’t go with it. Instead, Flores remains frozen in time from the first frame below to the second frame:

As Carroll is called safe, Flores finally drags his glove over to the bag. Too much, too late:

Two runs score there. 5-2 Arizona.

Oh, and then Alex Cobb’s hip flares up on him. Two pitches into his third inning, he’s out of the game. He appeared to barely make it through the second:

Still in it

With Cobb out early, Alex Wood comes in to play the role of stopper. He retires the side in order in the third inning, but in the fourth, that age/athleticism gap between these two lineups pops up again.

After a Jace Peterson leadoff double, Perdomo sees a hole between Alex Wood (whose delivery pulls him to the 3rd base bag) and first baseman Wade Jr. Perdomo drops the bunt down. Bailey springs out from behind the plate to make a ridiculous play on it, and it looks like Wood/Wade Jr. have been bailed out:

But the call is blown. And the Giants had lost their challenge earlier.

Carroll, the next hitter, gets popped by a misfired Wood changeup. Bases loaded, no outs.

This is the moment the Giants could use that lift. They see some hope yet in this game; they bring the middle infielders halfway in. A ground ball to Brandon Crawford would stop the bleeding.

It’s incredible that, at age 36, Crawford can still play shortstop. The Giants must believe in him to start him at the position in the peak moments of a playoff push. But he’s 36, and he doesn’t react the way he did when he was 26:

Duane Kuiper, on the Giants broadcast: “I mean, look, I watched Alex Wood’s reaction - and he thought this was a double play.”

It might not have been an easy double play to turn, but Crawford doesn’t get an out or a glove on it. Two runs score, and it’s 7-2 Arizona. It now feels like the Giants’ season is really over.

Punching back

But it wasn’t! In the fifth, the Giants get to Gallen. They scrape two runs across and load it up for Joc, who sees three fastballs. He fouls off the first and takes the next two:

In a theme that had already played out in a few other Gallen vs. Giant at-bats, Joc is clearly looking for something else. Probably something soft. But Gallen, as he did in those other at-bats, goes with his “surprise!” heater. Strike three, end of threat. 8-4 Arizona.

Okay, I get it

It was really over after that Pederson at-bat. But to cement my earlier point:

That’s Wilmer Flores almost losing a footrace with Alek Thomas to 1st on a routine ground ball out. It is reviewed with fascination on the Giants broadcast.

That’s Alek Thomas cruising into 3rd on a gapper that Yastrzemski can’t run down.

And this is Thomas running one down himself in the eighth:

Alright, that’s enough.

The Diamondbacks are young, and the Giants are older. San Francisco’s must-win game was not won, and their playoff number dropped to 5%. As I write this, both teams are already back at it, with a 12:40 start to close out the series. This could be the start of a window for the Diamondbacks and the close of one for the Giants. Hopefully this Diamondbacks team enjoys the moment, because one day the aging curve will come for them, too.