Add The California Post on Google SAN FRANCISCO — Even when everything goes right for the Giants’ bullpen, something still finds a way to go wrong, especially, it seems, against the Rockies.
The Giants were an inning away Friday night from a relief-heavy win over their company at the bottom of the National League West for the second time in the span of a week.
And for the second time, it all fell apart before they could close the door completely.
Dylan Smith earned some redemption in his first outing since surrendering the go-ahead three-run homer five days ago in Colorado, escaping a bases-loaded jam with nobody out in the seventh in one of the most impressive single innings from a San Francisco reliever this season.
Rafael Devers gave the Giants a one-run lead in the bottom half of the inning, and everything was setting up for a feel-good story about one of the league’s most problematic bullpens.
Turns out, there’s a reason these relievers aren’t considered reliable.
Tasked with closing out the one-run advantage, Caleb Kilian allowed the first three batters he faced to reach base, including a walk to pinch-hitter Troy Johnston, and allowed all three to come around to score in what turned out to be yet another agonizing loss, 4-3.
It was only made more painful by the false hope in the bottom of the ninth. Colorado closer Jordan Romano issued three walks, a confusing play went in the Giants’ favor upon video review and Rafael Devers made it a one-run game with his third RBI of the night.
But, even after Cole Carrigg was shown conclusively to have trapped a line drive off the bat of Casey Schmitt to load the bases with one out, Bryce Eldridge grounded out on the first pitch he saw from Romano’s replacement, Juan Mejia, who earned a one-pitch save for getting out of the fraught situation.
Dylan Smith escaped an even stickier jam, entering with the bases loaded and nobody out in the sixth, but four clean innings, it turned out, was too much to ask of this group of relievers.
That, however, was the situation manager Tony Vitello was facing when he came out to get Robbie Ray with nobody out and the bases loaded in the sixth inning.
Ray walked the first three batters of the inning, finishing five-plus innings with six in total, setting up Smith to enter just about the stickiest situation imaginable.
But, against all odds, he got Tyler Freeman to pop out on a first-pitch slider, worked his way back from a 2-0 count to strike out Willi Castro and benefited from the glovework of Luis Arraez, who cleanly fielded a sharp grounder off the bat of Mickey Moniak for the third out.
Kilian, on the flip side, pitched himself into trouble he couldn’t escape. He was handed the loss and a blown save, his third in 11 opportunities. He has allowed nine earned runs in his past six appearances, raising his ERA to 4.74 from 2.97 before his last blown save.
Last week at Colorado, Giants relievers had limited the Rockies to just one one over seven innings in the final two games of the series before Smith served up a three-run homer to Kyle Karros in their 7-6 loss. Once again, the dam proved incapable of holding.
Falling to 3-5 against the NL West’s perennial bottom feeders, the Giants have now lost as many games to the Rockies this season as they did in 2024 and 2025 combined (21-5).
Devers was responsible for all of the Giants’ runs, leading off the second with his 19th home run of the season to put them ahead 1-0, and finished 3-for-3 with an intentional walk and a sacrifice fly.
The solo shot, which he golfed onto the arcade in right field, was his 17th homer in his past 58 games dating back to May 6, when he hit his third of the season. At the time, Devers was on pace for just 14 over 162 games.
Now, if he can slug one more in the next two games, he would become the first Giants hitter since Barry Bonds to go into the All-Star break with at least 20 home runs.
Ray continued to limit runs, yielding three or fewer for the sixth time in his past seven starts to lower his ERA to a rotation-best 3.38, but the way he got there was concerning.
He put six runners on base via walks, including the first three batters he faced in the sixth. Shockingly (or not), it was still one away from a season-high seven back on May 24.
The left-hander struggled to land his pitches for strikes most of his time on the mound, finding the strike zone on only 53 of his 100 pitches, and it eventually caught up to him.
Ray threw only one strike to each of the three batters he walked to begin the sixth.
The one walk by Kilian, however, came back to hurt them the worst.
Tyler Mahle will try to complete five innings for only the second time in four starts since returning from a hamstring strain. It will be a rematch from the last time he took the mound, also against the Rockies, who got to him for four early runs in an eventual 7-6 loss last week at Coors Field.
