Starting pitching remained an issue for the San Francisco Giants on Saturday as Jordan Hicks was roughed up in his return to Busch Stadium.
Hicks gave up five earned runs on six hits in four innings in what became a 9-4 Giants loss to the St. Louis Cardinals, marking San Francisco’s fourth straight defeat.
The Giants allowed four home runs, including two to Cardinals right fielder Alec Burleson, who went 3 for 4 with five RBI. Rookie shortstop Mason Winn was 3 for 5 and drove in a run in the Cardinals’ win.
Giants starters are now 2-7 this month. Entering Saturday, the Giants’ starting staff, beset by injuries to Blake Snell and, more recently, Kyle Harrison, had a 4.82 ERA in June with opposing batters hitting .280.
Hicks, who spent the first four-plus seasons of his big league career with the Cardinals, has now gone six starts without a win and has not lasted more than 5 1/3 innings in any of them.
“It was a good experience being back out there at Busch,” Hicks told reporters. “Overall, I just didn’t have my best stuff today, and I’m just looking to move on after this one.”
Michael Conforto was the Giants’ lone bright spot, going 2 for 4 and scoring three runs.
“We scored three runs in the first, and we felt pretty good about where we are,” Giants manager Bob Melvin told reporters. “All of a sudden, they hit a two-run homer, and they had a couple more big swings which could change the game in a hurry.”
Jorge Soler got the Giants on the board as his two-out RBI single in the top of the first inning brought home Brett Wisely. Two batters later, Conforto knocked in Soler and Matt Chapman to give the Giants a 3-0 lead.
The Cardinals responded in their half of the inning when Paul Goldschmidt smashed Hicks’ pitch to left-center field, scoring Burleson to cut San Francisco’s lead to 3-2. It was the five-time Silver Slugger’s 350th career homer.
Conforto drove in his third run of the game after he doubled to right field, bringing home Chapman and giving the Giants a 4-2 cushion in the top of the third.
“He’s made an adjustment, and he looks like he’s much shorter to the ball right now,” Melvin said about Conforto’s plate approach. “Today was a big day for him to feel like he was earlier this season when he came back from the IL.”
Hicks’ struggled in the fourth inning as the Cardinals shifted the momentum in their favor.
With two outs and no one on, Dylan Carlson singled, and Mason Wynn doubled to put runners on second and third. Burleson hit a three-run bomb off of Hicks’ 94 mph sinker, giving the Cardinals a 5-4 lead.
In St. Louis on Saturday, it was 94 degrees with 41% humidity. Hicks said the conditions took a toll on him as he labored through his start.
“I would say my legs got pretty dead after the third, to be honest,” Hicks said. “I could always see when I was on the Cardinals that other pitchers looked pretty dead out there. When you get them up to 20-30 pitches, that’s when we usually do our damage.”
Burleson found more success at the plate in the sixth after Hicks came out of the game. He hit a two-run homer to center field, this time off relief pitcher Sean Hjelle, giving St. Louis a three-run cushion.
Saturday’s game was Burleson’s first multi-homer performance of his career.
Brendan Donovan’s solo home run iced the game for the Cardinals in the seventh inning as St. Louis took a commanding 8-4 lead.
In his return from Triple-A, outfielder Luis Matos went 1 for 4 as the ninth hitter in the lineup. With Mike Yastrzemski on the IL with a left oblique strain, Matos will likely get more chances to prove he could stay on the big league roster.
The Giants finish the series against St. Louis on Sunday. San Francisco ace Logan Webb is expected to get the start.
Source: www.mercurynews.com