By Jeremy Harness

The Giants had Madison Bumgarner on the hill Wednesday night, and the left-hander responded with a very nice performance and gave his team a chance to win.

However, the opposing pitcher was a tad more dominant and rendered Bumgarner’s outing an afterthought.

Both went eight innings, but the difference came in a sixth inning that saw the Seattle Mariners drop a two-spot on the lefty that carried the Giants to last year’s World Series title. In that inning, Austin Jackson and Robinson Cano tagged Bumgarner for RBI extra-base hits to give all the run support that Felix Hernandez needed in a 2-0 Giants loss at Safeco Field.

Hernandez gave up only four hits in shutting out the Giants, walking two and striking out five batters. Meanwhile, Bumgarner also gave up four hits and walked just one batter against nine strikeouts, but Cano and Jackson combined to do him in on Wednesday.

The Giants never got any real momentum against Hernandez, and the closest they came to getting on track was in the top of the seventh inning, just after Seattle grabbed the two-run lead. Brandon Crawford reached base on a throwing error by Cano, and then two batters later, Casey McGehee worked the count full before drawing a walk to advance Crawford in scoring
position.

However, as they have frequently experienced at home this year, the Giants could not come up with the big hit to change the momentum of the game. The next batter, Justin Maxwell grounded out to third to end the threat and let Hernandez off the hook.

The Giants only got one more batter on base the rest of the way, and they will return to Safeco Field Thursday afternoon in the hopes of taking the finale to split the four-game home-and-home series.