San Francisco Giants starter Sean Manaea (52) surrenders a three run homer in the top of the second to the Washington Nationals Riley Adams (left) at Oracle Park in San Francisco on Wed May 10, 2023 (AP News photo)

By Troy Ewers

SAN FRANCISCO–Day game here in San Francisco and it’s the final game of this three game series with the San Francisco Giants (16-20) and Washington Nationals (16-21), series at 1-1. Tuesday night Logan Webb got the W and the debut of Casey Schmitt was the topic of conversation. Wednesday though, was a different conversation as the Nationals came away in an 11-6 laugher at Oracle Park.

On the mound was Sean Manaea and a quick 1-2-3 inning provided some hope from Giants fans, but that would change the very next inning. A four run inning, three of those runs came off a Riley Adams home run and the wheels would fall off for Manaea from there.

The third inning was an avalanche, two walks, an error, two hits would force a pitching change and Tristan Beck would replace Sean Manaea, but at that point the damage was already felt, 8-0 in the third inning. Tristan Beck’s outing would hold it down for the next five innings, even though he allowed another two runs, but was still the bandage to lessen the bleeding.

On the offensive side for the Giants, the ball just wasn’t finding any gaps, in the beginning, but they weren’t being struck out. The final two innings seemed like the canteen in the middle of the desert with Conforto and Lamonte getting big late game home runs making the game 11-6, but the canteen was a mirage and the hole they dug themselves was too deep to climb out of.

Nationals take the game and the series and the Giants see the Diamondbacks next series.The starters Josiah Gray and Sean Manaea leave here with a different confidence level and some changes on the stat sheet. Josaiah Gray leaves with a 3-5 record and Manaea leaves with a 1-2 record.

As for Casey Schmitt, his debut has two games in the bag were the positives you want to see as a manager and it creates a “good” problem when Crawford comes back and hopefully once Mike Yastrzemski comes back this lineup catches his stride.

The Giants open a four game series at Chase Field in Arizona starting Thu May 11 starting pitcher for the Giants not announced and for the Arizona Diamondbacks lefthander Tommy Henry (1-0 ERA 5.17) first pitch at 6:40 pm PT.