DeSclafani surrenders 3 home runs as SF Giants fall to Mets
NEW YORK — It took three pitches to spoil a homecoming of sorts for Anthony DeSclafani and send the Giants to a loss Saturday in their second game against the Mets.
DeSclafani surrendered a trio of home runs in the span of four batters in the third inning Saturday, while the Giants’ bats were unable to crack Justin Verlander in a 4-1 loss. San Francisco hasn’t announced its pitching plans for Sunday, when it will attempt to avoid dropping consecutive series for the first time since the first weekend of June.
The Giants broke through in the seventh and brought the tying run to the plate but wasn’t able to replicate the magic from the night before. The inning even transpired similarly, kickstarted by a throwing error from first baseman Pete Alonso, but Brandon Crawford struck out to end the threat on a slider from Verlander, his 102nd and final pitch of the game.
The Giants, who were held to two runs on five hits for the first seven innings of Friday night’s win, mustered only one run on five hits Saturday. Their come-from-behind win Friday stands as their only game in their past six contests in which they scored more than three runs or recorded more than six hits.
DeSclafani, who grew up about 90 minutes away in northern New Jersey, has never beaten the Mets in nine starts against them. It was in this ballpark last April that he aggravated an ankle injury that eventually ended his season and required surgery.
He won’t be left with much better memories from his outing Saturday.
After Patrick Bailey’s heroics Friday, it was the Mets’ rookie catcher who started their scoring Saturday.
Francisco Alvarez obliterated the first pitch he saw from DeSclafani in the bottom of the third. After retiring the first seven Mets batters in order (aided by a 3-6-3 double play that erased a hit batsman), DeSclafani started Alvarez with a sinker on the outer half of the plate, and the power-hitting catcher went with the pitch to drive it well over the wall in right-center field, 416 feet away, and sent it screaming at 111.5 mph off the bat.
DeSclafani recovered to strike out No. 9 hitter Luis Guillorme, but more trouble awaited at the top of the lineup.
Brandon Nimmo and Francisco Lindor went back-to-back in their second trips to the plate against DeSclafani. He wouldn’t get a chance to face them a third time, as he was lifted for Sean Manaea after three innings.
DeSclafani reached two strikes on both hitters but was unable to put them away. He had gotten one strike on Nimmo with a front-door slider that broke over the inside corner and went back to the pitch a second time, but Nimmo was ready. Lindor’s homer came on a fastball down the middle after DeSclafani had gotten ahead by working the edges of the strike zone.
The Mets got only one hit besides their three homers.
J.D. Davis collected a pair of hits and scored the Giants’ only run playing his second game back in New York, where he played for three-and-a-half seasons before being traded to San Francisco last summer. But the rest of the lineup was held in check.
Since their 10-game win streak came to an end June 22, the Giants’ .209 batting average is third-worst in the majors.