The Giants are supposed to be crushing left-handed pitchers. Their roster is stacked with right-handed hitters who are meant to do some of their most lethal damage against lefties.
That has not been the case. Not even close. Four weeks into the 2025 season, the Giants still haven’t figured out how to succeed against opponents pitching from the left side.
Tuesday night at Oracle Park, another lefty had his way with Giants hitters when Milwaukee’s Jose Quintana cruised through six innings of one-run ball. It was among many things that went wrong as the Giants were thrashed 11-3, their most one-sided loss of the season, which got so bad that infielder Christian Koss pitched the ninth inning.
The Giants now are 2-7 in games in which the opposing team starts a left-hander and they’re a whopping 13-2 when the other team starts a righty.
Manager Bob Melvin insisted it’s a small sample, but until further notice, it’s a troubling trend that would need to change if the Giants are serious about contending this year.
Lefties with effective changeups, like Quintana, the Reds’ Nick Lodolo and the Angels’ Tyler Anderson, have been particularly challenging for Giants hitters.
San Francisco’s marquee free-agent signing, Willy Adames, is 3-for-33 off lefties. Wilmer Flores is 5-for-29, Patrick Bailey is 2-for-18 and Luis Matos is 2-for-21 in at-bats against southpaws. Speaking of Matos, he easily had the worst at-bat of the night when he was fed four changeups out of the strike zone and strangely swung at three of them. He badly missed the first two and finally made contact on the fourth, bouncing into a routine double play.
It wasn’t just the offense’s continued woes against lefties that was problematic on Tuesday. The pitching and defense were to blame, too.
Jordan Hicks kept the Giants in the game through five innings as they trailed 3-1. But the evening turned in the sixth when the Brewers struck for eight runs, three off Hicks (two earned) and five off reliever Lou Trivino, four of which were produced on Christian Yelich’s grand slam over the center-field wall.
In the fateful sixth, Adames made a slightly wide throw from shortstop that pulled David Villar off of first base. Villar’s inexperience at the position was made apparent when he didn’t do a better job moving his foot back to the bag or trying to apply a tag.
Things got worse when Bailey, the Giants’ Gold Glove catcher, was charged with a passed ball and throwing error on the same play. Shortly thereafter, Trivino entered from the bullpen and was further roughed up.
The game was a rare clunker for the Giants, who had lost by more than two runs just once this season. Every other game, they had a fighting chance. Not Tuesday. Nothing went well, starting with the Giants’ inefficiencies against another left-handed pitcher.
“We’re still early in the season,” Melvin said. “I think we have a lineup that should work well against left-handed pitching.”
Eldridge returns
On Tuesday, the Giants received promising news from one of their minor-league affiliates, Double-A Richmond: The franchise’s top prospect, Bryce Eldridge, smashed a home run in his first at-bat of the season. The 6-foot-7 first baseman and designated hitter had been rehabbing a wrist injury since the end of spring training.
Asked if developments at the major-league level would have an impact on Eldridge’s timetable, Melvin said, “I’m not really sure about that. He’s going to have to perform to get here. That’s something Buster (Posey) stated, that if you perform well, you have an opportunity in the big leagues.”
Melvin noted the Giants are satisfied with their designated hitter production from Flores, who had three hits Tuesday and drove in his 25th run, pulling him into a tie for the MLB lead in runs batted in.
First base is another story. LaMonte Wade Jr. is struggling, and Casey Schmitt is on the injured list, which is why Villar started at first Tuesday.
“LaMonte’s going to pick it up,” said Melvin, reiterating the team’s faith in Wade.
Still, the 20-year-old Eldridge is the future. He hit a breaking ball from Akron right-hander Tommy Mace over the wall in right-center. It was a reminder of his spectacular 2024 season in which he opened in Low-A and reached Triple-A while hitting .291 with an .890 OPS, 23 homers and 116 RBIs.
“All right, well, get him here now,” Melvin joked before the game when someone showed him the clip of Eldridge’s homer. After contact was made, Melvin stopped watching. “I don’t need to see where it landed,” he said.
In all seriousness, Melvin said, “We watch everybody, but obviously, he’s the top prospect in the organization. He was with us in spring training, and we feel he has a really bright future. We’ll take a hard look at him.”
Yeah, but will he hit lefties? The Giants will be closely monitoring.