Bumbling Giants flushed by last-place Rockies

AT&T PARK — Monday night’s Giants homecoming was no ordinary game.

After a humiliating 14-6 loss in Washington on Sunday, San Francisco returned home looking forward to a rejuvenating series against the last-place Colorado Rockies sans Troy Tulowitzki and Michael Cuddyer.

Instead, the Giants entered into battle with themselves.

San Francisco fell 3-2 in a game muddled with big errors, balks and two heated arguments with home plate umpire Doug Eddings.

Jake Peavy (L, 3-13, 4.34 ERA) pitched a solid game, dealing five strikeouts over seven innings while allowing six hits and just one earned run.

But shoddy play behind the mound that resulted in four errors put the Giants against a wall.

Photos by Godofredo Vasquez/SFBay

It all started in the first. The game’s very first play incurred the very first error of the game when Charlie Blackmon reached first on a botched throw from second baseman Joe Panik.

Blackmon would go on to score without any hits from his teammates. Peavy threw a pickoff attempt into center field that brought Blackmon to third before a Justin Morneau sacrifice fly brought him home.

Manager Bruce Bochy said it was all downhill from there:

“I think you have to look at our play early. It was a little awkward, first inning, third inning…We made four errors. That’s not going to help our cause. If you do that you have to score some runs…Just not a well-played game that caught up with us.”

The Rockies’ other two runs came in the fourth inning amidst a flurry of errors. Drew Stubbs reached first on an off-line throw to first from Brandon Crawford.

The Giants shortstop committed his second error in the following at-bat, with yet another sloppy throw to first that put runners on the corners with no outs.

Peavy, facing National League Player of the Week Nolan Arenado, then balked to bring Stubbs home. A series of soft grounders and sacrifice flies — and an increasingly angry Peavy — handed the Rockies their final run.

The Giants offense barely kept up their end. Buster Posey took advantage of an Angel Pagan leadoff double in the first inning for a run. Andrew Susac notched his second career home run, his first at AT&T Park, to score the other.

Frustrations mounted heavy in the Giants dugout as the innings wore on with no comeback in sight. So the team, and fans, took it out on home plate umpire Doug Eddings.

An emotional Peavy got in a yelling match with Eddings over the strike zone and Bochy was ejected in the eighth inning after Eddings called strikeout on a controversially-low slider to Buster Posey with Hunter Pence on second and no outs.

Bochy acknowledged his frustration with Eddings’ call:

“I didn’t like it, that’s why I wasn’t around to watch the rest of the game. … You got Posey up there and that’s a tough way to end that at bat.”

The Giants won only one battle with the umps: In the seventh,D.J. LeMahieu was called safe at home after a Blackmon single to right field. Susac’s tag was close enough for a review, and a fired-up Peavy exchanged words with Eddings. The call was overturned, LeMahieu was out, granting the Giants their only real victory of the day.

Peavy had a lot to say about his interactions with Eddings:

“Doug’s been around for a long time and he’s a good umpire. I was just asking him to look at those pitches and I thought they were there. Obviously he didn’t. I’m just glad it didn’t cost us any more runs … I felt like we got the guy out at home. I felt like those pitches were strikes, so I felt like I had a lot to talk about with him.”

As the story has gone this season, the Giants offense fell short. They dug their own grave and, despite their passionate attempt, couldn’t climb out.

Notes

Tim Lincecum will be skipped for his next start Thursday, Yusmeiro Petit will fill in. Lincecum has struggled as of late. He pitched 2-2/3 innings against the Nationals his previous start, allowing six hits and four earned runs. … Before today’s game, Bochy said Marco Scutaro is not expected to be back this season.