Snakes sink stumbling Giants in shutout

The Giants took the field Friday night hours after a 12-inning loss to Arizona, with the home club’s six-run showing Thursday night possibly indicating the offense was rising out of its slump.

But, if possible, San Francisco sunk even lower into their slump. The Diamondbacks demolished Jake Peavy and company 9-0, sinking the Giants to 3-9 to start the season.

This start isn’t just bad, it’s historically awful. J.T Snow, Robb Nen, Jeff Kent, Barry Bonds, Kirk Rueter and the 2000 Giants starred on the last San Francisco club to start a season 3-9.

But a start is just a start. Slumps are inevitable. The 2000 Giants, a talented bunch, won 97 games — 11 ahead of the Dodgers — and the NL West title that year.

Long term what-ifs aside, the Giants completely flopped Friday night. One runner reached scoring position, Joe Panik in the bottom of the ninth, and the bats hit a collective four hits off Diamondbacks’ starter Josh Collmenter, who pitched the first Major League complete game this season.

Photos by Scot Tucker/SFBay

Not even Buster Posey, who came in batting a career .550 against Collmenter, could muster a hit.

After tonight’s loss exposed weakness on both sides of the ball, manager Bruce Bochy was out of answers:

“We’re just not playing very well … I’m saying right now we’re not. In general, the last eight games, we haven’t played well.”

The Diamondbacks rocked Jake Peavy, who allowed eight hits and four runs in just 3-2/3 innings of work. He said after the game that he started to feel back tightness early on:

“Felt tightness in the 2nd inning. Started feeling it early, and then it got a little bit worse from inning to inning. I still had plenty to get out and make better pitch location.”

Bochy said he noticed there was an issue:

“He wasn’t finishing his pitches.”

The bullpen couldn’t hold the Snakes’ bats down, either. George Kontos, Ryan Vogelsong and Yusmeiro Petit collectively gave up five extra runs.

Six different Diamondbacks scored RBIs: Jake Lamb knocked in two, A.J. Pollock, Tuffy Gosewisch, Paul Goldschmidt and even Collmenter.

The Snakes collected 18 hits in total, 10 off the lionized Giants bullpen.

The Giants continue this four-game series tomorrow at 6:05 p.m. after the World Series ring ceremony preceding the game. Hopefully tomorrow’s celebration can turn some switch on for the Giants, and remind them of what they’re capable of.

Peavy said of tomorrow’s celebration in light of the drought:

“We’re playing as hard as I know the San Francisco Giants can play. It’s just not happening. Tomorrow is still gonna be fun, that being said.”

Notes

Casey McGehee made his first start at AT&T on third after nursing an injured knee, though he looked hesitant to make any big plays defensively. Nothing, he said, was really bothering him: “I feel it from time to time, I haven’t had any set backs…It was good to be back on the field.”