What we learned as Reds blast four homers off Harrison in Giants’ loss originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
Less than 24 hours after celebrating the highlight of their 2024 MLB season up to this point, the Giants quickly were brought back to reality during a 6-4 loss to the Cincinnati Reds on Saturday at Great American Ball Park.
Pitching in the aftermath of Blake Snell’s brilliant no-hitter, Kyle Harrison got knocked around early and often, with his day ending after serving up his fourth home run of the afternoon. Two of the Reds’ home runs came from Tyler Stephenson, who had homered only once in his previous 15 games.
San Francisco’s season-long struggles at the plate continued, largely due to a strong outing by Cincinnati starting pitcher Hunter Greene. Greene allowed one hit and had 11 strikeouts in six solid innings to win his third consecutive decision.
The Giants finally broke through after Greene exited. They got some help from the Reds’ defense, too.
Matt Chapman doubled leading off the seventh against Justin Wilson and took third when Cincinnati center fielder TJ Friedl bobbled the ball. As Chapman was sliding into third, Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz bounced a relay throw into the dugout, allowing Chapman to get up and score.
Michael Conforto followed with his 11th home run of the season, crushing a 3-1 fastball from Wilson into the left field stands at Great American Ball Park.
Jerar Encarnación, called up from Triple-A Sacramento a day earlier, cut the gap to 6-3 with his first home run of the season, a two-out solo drive off Tony Santillan in the eighth.
Chapman clubbed his 16th home run of the season off Reds closer Edwin Diaz in the ninth inning.
Tyler Fitzgerald, who before the game was named the NL Rookie of the Month for July, went hitless and struck out swinging in three of his four at-bats.
Here are the takeaways from Saturday’s game:
Searching For .500
Manager Bob Melvin has insisted that the most important hurdle for the Giants right now is getting back to the .500 mark. They had a chance to do that Saturday but missed the opportunity to cash in.
It has been more than two months since San Francisco was at the even mark. That was on May 31 when the Giants were 29-29.
Since then, it has been a struggle to get anything going consistently although the Giants had won seven of their previous nine games.
At 55-57, the Giants still have time to make a run to get into the playoffs, and most likely it will have to be via the…