With a healthier and deeper lineup, the Giants’ offense is starting to produce like many within the organization had hoped it would this season.
Albeit a very small sample size — and against one of MLB’s worst teams — the Giants have combined for 18 runs over the last two games after San Francisco’s 9-1 over the Colorado Rockies on Saturday at Oracle Park.
The Giants scored early and often and tallied 13 hits just one night after … scoring nine runs on 13 hits.
In speaking to reporters after the game, Giants manager Gabe Kapler credited the team’s improving health and the return of a few key bats for the lineup’s recent success.
“I think our guys are swinging the bats well, obviously in this series, but I think even leading up to this series you can see some small signals of the offense coming to life and I think that’s the result of having a little bit more full lineup and a deeper bench,” Kapler said.
“And now you can see with Michael Conforto coming back here in the next few days we’re going to get even a little bit deeper. As I’ve mentioned, the depth is about the lineup, but it’s also about the guys we have on the bench and coming off the bench. I do think there’s been some signs of life offensively.”
One of the key contributors in this series has been outfielder Mike Yastrzemski, who is a combined 6-for-7 at the plate with two doubles and three RBI in the two games against Colorado.
Yastrzemski joined NBC Sports Bay Area’s Carlos Ramirez and George Kontos on “Giants Postgame Live,” where he explained why offensive explosions like Saturday night’s win are important for the team’s psyche.
“I think both are really good, with how our last week went, I think we needed a game where we prove to ourselves that we still have fight in us and that we still had that mental side to it and tonight we just went out and played very confidently,” Yastrzemski said. “I think yesterday was a big help for leading into today. We’re just trying to ride the good game.”
The primary beneficiary of the offense’s big game was starting pitcher Logan Webb, who has received just about as little run support from his offense as any pitcher in the league this season.
“That was nice,” Webb told Ramirez and Kontos on “Giants Postgame Live.” “There’s a little pressure on me to make sure I go out there and throw up some zeroes, but whenever you get some first-inning runs, especially a home run from Thairo like that, it’s always good for the team no matter what, but I thought the guys came out with a lot of energy today, they did a great job on offense, they did a great job on defense.”
After losing six straight games and falling back to a .500 record this week, the Giants have won two straight against the lowly Rockies, which perhaps was the exact medicine they needed in order to turn things around for the stretch run.
The Giants have been one of the streakiest teams this season, but they’ll need to produce more complete-team wins like Saturday’s throughout the 20 remaining regular-season games in order to snag one of the three NL Wild-Card spots.
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