SAN FRANCISCO -- Before his first game back at Oracle Park, Bruce Bochy smiled when asked about all the one-run games he played here over the years. The "torture" was fun sometimes, he admitted, but he much prefers being in charge of a team that leads the Majors in runs.
Bochy's Texas Rangers only scored two of them on Friday, but with the way the Giants are going right now, that didn't matter. They lost 2-1, the lone run coming in the ninth when Heliot Ramos scalded a double 112.7 mph, took third on a misplay and scored on a slow grounder. The Giants now have scored exactly one run in eight of their last 20 games.
A tribute video for Bochy provided the only excitement until the sixth, when Nathaniel Lowe took Ross Stripling into the cove and Mitch Garver followed with a blast halfway up the bleachers in left. The Giants had done nothing offensively to that point, and they finished with just two singles off righty Jon Gray, the former Colorado Rockie. Gray went seven shutout innings before giving way to Aroldis Chapman, who battled some wildness but didn't allow a run.
Chapman walked Patrick Bailey with one out and threw two wild pitches, allowing Bailey to reach third. But Mark Mathias, who had been sent up to pinch-hit for Brandon Crawford, struck out and Luis Matos did the same.
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Back On Track
It was a rough start to the season for Stripling, so much so that his IL stint ended up being about fixing his mechanics as much as his lower back tightness. But he's starting to find his stride, and he has settled in as another reliable option behind Logan Webb and Alex Cobb -- even though the Giants sometimes still use an opener in his starts.
Stripling came on in the second and cruised into the sixth before Lowe and Garver went back-to-back with two outs. He still finished with a solid line: 5 innings, 5 hits, 2 earned runs, 0 walks, 3 strikeouts.
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In his last nine appearances -- six starts and three "bulk innings" outings -- Stripling has a 3.38 ERA and 1.00 WHIP. He has 32 strikeouts and just one walk over that span, but the homers continue to be an issue.
Stripling has allowed seven in his last 40 innings and 17 overall this season. Among pitchers with at least 70 innings this season, Stripling ranks third in home runs allowed per nine innings (2.12). The two pitchers ahead of him -- Ben Lively and Luke Weaver -- play in Cincinnati, a much more hitter-friendly yard than Oracle Park.
Great Scott
It was a wild week for Scott Alexander, the left-handed opener. Alexander started Tuesday night in Anaheim and didn't record an out before he was pulled, with three runs going on his line and his ERA jumping from 3.21 to 4.01. Friday's appearance was just about the complete opposite.
The Giants used Alexander in front of Stripling so that he could face the top of the lineup, which includes tough lefties Corey Seager and Nathaniel Lowe. Alexander struck out Marcus Semien to start the game and then froze Seager -- with Bailey providing a slick frame. After walking Adolis Garcia, he got Lowe to fly out.
Slater Is Searching
Bochy once sent Madison Bumgarner up to pinch-hit against Chapman, reasoning that his ace had the best chance of catching up to the left-hander's legendary fastball. On Friday, he brought Chapman in to pitch the eighth and the Giants immediately countered with Austin Slater, who has been a lefty-killer most of his career.
Slater went down on three pitches, though, continuing what has been a rough couple of months. After going 3-for-3 on June 16, he was batting .431 with an OPS of nearly 1.000. But Slater has just 10 hits in his last 70 at-bats, along with 24 strikeouts. Slater's OPS has dipped about 250 points during the stretch.
