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After an ’embarrassing’ start, Giants’ Justin Verlander gets candid about what’s wrong

The 42-year-old right-hander is winless in 14 starts this season and was trounced by the A's in his worst outing of the season on Friday.

A baseball player in a black jersey with an orange "SF" emblem is mid-pitch on a field. He wears a light blue cap, glove, and holds a baseball. The crowd is blurred behind him.
Justin Verlander is now 0-6 with a 4.84 ERA and the Giants are 4-10 in the pitcher’s starts this season. | Source: Sara Nevis/Associated Press

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WEST SACRAMENTO – The pitches are hitting too many barrels. The mechanics are a work in progress. And the results aren’t up to par.

For Justin Verlander, there’s one common thread that runs through the entire narrative of his struggles with the Giants.

“I’m just not deceptive enough,” he said Friday night after producing his worst pitching line of the season in the Giants’ shoddy and sloppy 11-2 loss to the A’s.

The 42-year-old remains winless in 14 starts, and while he has pitched well enough to earn several wins, something’s obviously missing. It was never more obvious than Friday when he lasted just three innings, coughed up a season-high six runs, and transparently spoke afterward about what is wrong and how he can get right.

“Guys are able to execute their game plan against me too easily,” Verlander said. “I can’t quite get fastballs by guys when I should be able to. I can’t quite get them to chase the good off-speed pitch. When I do throw a bad one, they’re on it.”

Verlander joined the Giants on a one-year contract, fully convinced he still had the goods to succeed in the majors while chasing the rare milestone of 300 wins — he’s still stuck on 262. That he is the oldest athlete in the four major North American professional sports didn’t make him second guess his intentions or sway the Giants, who believed in him enough to pay him a $15 million salary.

However, Verlander is 0-6 with a 4.84 ERA, and the Giants are 4-10 in his starts. Friday, they managed just six hits. They made three errors and could have been charged with more. And reliever Mason Black gave up five runs. But this loss was on Verlander, who was coming off a solid start but failed to keep the momentum.

Both a perfectionist and realist, Verlander was candid and detailed in his postgame interview and said his performance was “frankly embarrassing” and that he needs to constantly tweak his mechanics to give him the best chance to make more competitive starts.

It has been a struggle.

“You test something, and you go out there and try it and see if it works or not,” he said. “If it’s not working, you find something else. I’m already on to the next thing, I threw some balls against the wall and felt some different mechanics that I’ve been thinking about. I’m optimistic that’s going to be the next thing that works.

“I’ve had two or three instances in my career where everything I’ve known to try to fix something doesn’t work, and I’ve kind of had to reinvent the wheel. I feel I’m kind of there where it’s like, ‘All right, well, now it’s time to just throw s— against the wall and see what works.’ Hopefully I can rely on a lot of my past and understand biomechanics and my mechanics and figure it out quickly.”

He’ll need fewer performances like Friday’s. 

A baseball game is being played at a stadium with a green field and packed stands. The skyline and a golden tower are visible in the background.
The Giants' blowout defeat marked their first regular-season game at Sutter Health Park, where the A's are playing home games this year. | Source: Sara Nevis/Associated Press

“I know that I can still be successful with the given stuff that I have at this level,” Verlander said. “I’m just not deceptive enough right now, and I need to figure out how to blend stuff better. Mechanically I’m not delivering the pitch the way that I’m capable of to deceive the hitter.”

A perfect example came on Brent Rooker’s second-inning RBI double that concluded a four-run rally. Verlander thought he “beat him to the spot” with a fastball, but Rooker managed to get his barrel on the ball and slap it to the opposite field.

“Was that a great swing?” Verlander said. “No, but it was just good enough, to squeak one inside the line when I felt like I had him set up and probably beat him there. His reaction was quick enough that he was able to do that.”

Verlander pitched 20 years to the day after he made his big-league debut. On the Fourth of July in 2005, he worked 5 ⅓ innings for the Tigers and lost in Cleveland. He has gone on to claim three Cy Young Awards, three no-hitters, and nine All-Star selections, and now he’s trying to cap a Hall of Fame career on a positive note.

“You play for 20 years, your body’s not the same,” he said. “I’m not the same person I was 20 years ago. So you have to adjust to what you have at that given time.”

Verlander pitched in the wake of Robbie Ray tossing a complete game and the offense providing plenty of support in a 7-2 win in Arizona, but the Giants were back in their funk mode Friday. Left fielder Heliot Ramos bobbled the ball on a couple of plays, second baseman Tyler Fitzgerald dropped a ball at the bag and two third basemen, Brett Wisely and newcomer Sergio Alcántara, made errors.

Manager Bob Melvin called it a “lack of focus on the defensive end, and that’s a concern” but was making no excuses despite the team arriving from Arizona in the wee hours Friday and playing at a minor-league facility.

The good news is that Gold Glove third baseman Matt Chapman, after injuring his right hand June 8, is expected to rejoin the lineup Saturday. In a Triple-A rehab game Friday, he went 0-for-3 with a walk. Ace Logan Webb, who grew up in Rocklin an A’s fan and often visited the Sacramento park as a kid when the River Cats were an A’s affiliate, is Saturday’s starter.