San Diego Padres Jurickson Profar (10) hit an RBI single in the bottom of the fifth inning at Petco Park in San Diego against the San Francisco Giants on Thu Mar 28, 2024 (AP News photo)

Thursday, March 28, 2024

Petco Park

San Diego, California

San Francisco Giants 4 (0-1)

San Diego Padres 6 (2-1)

Win: Yuki Matsui (1-0)

Loss: Luke Jackson (0-1)

Save: Robert Suarez (2)

Time: 2:34

Attendance: 44,953

By Stephen Ruderman

The Giants sputtered late on Opening Day, as after what was mostly a seesaw battle, the Padres scored four runs in the bottom of the seventh inning, and the Giants ended up losing 6-4 to open the 2024 Regular Season.

Today was the start of a new season and a new era for the Giants. A whole number of people were making their Giants debut today, including most notably, Manager Bob Melvin. Melvin was returning to San Diego, where he managed the Padres to the National League Championship Series in 2022, but left for the Giants after an 82-80 season last year.

For the Padres, they were playing their third game of the season, as they opened the season by splitting two games with the Los Angeles Dodgers in Seoul, South Korea.

Speaking of South Korea, their native son, Jung-hoo Lee, who was signed by the Giants over the off-season, led off the game to make his major league debut. Lee saw three pitches from Yu Darvish and struck out, as Darvish threw a 1-2-3 inning.

Darvish was opposed by Logan Webb, who was making his third-straight opening day start for the Giants. Webb also threw a 1-2-3 inning in the first, and both pitchers threw 1-2-3 innings again in the second.

Michael Conforto lined a double down the right-field line to start the top of the third. Patrick Bailey flew out to center-field, but Nick Ahmed took a high fastball from Darvish, and smoked it down the left-field line for a double to score Conforto, as the Giants struck first.

Webb threw a 1-2-3 bottom of the third, and set down the first nine men he faced. LaMonte Wade Jr. and Matt Chapman singled to start the fourth, but the Giants were unable to do anything with it. Xander Bogaerts hit a bloop single to center on the first pitch of the bottom of the fourth, but that was followed up by a 4-6-3 double play off the bat of Fernendo Tatis Jr. Nick Cronenworth then grounded out to short, and Webb was cruising through four innings.

With two outs in the top of the fifth, Lee lined his first big league hit to center, but he was immediately picked off by Darvish to end the inning.

“I did get my hit, but right after I got picked off by Darvish, so I never really got that time to feel that I actually got a hit,” said Lee through his interpreter, Justin Han. “The most memorable moment has to be the packed crowds. The level of baseball is way higher here in the major leagues. The level of fans is [at] a higher volume, also.”

Things got tough for Webb in the bottom of the fifth. Manny Machado walked to start the inning, and Ha-seong Kim singled Machado to third. Jurickson Profar then hit a weak ground ball in the vicinity of second base, but it found its way into right-center for a base-hit, as Machado scored to tie the game. Luis Campusano followed that up with a base-hit to load the bases.

The Padres had the bases loaded with nobody out and a run already in with Tylor Wade at the plate. Tylor Wade hit a little ground ball along the first-base line that was picked up by first-baseman LaMonte Wade, who applied a tag on Tylor Wade, but missed it according to First Base Umpire Adam Hamari. Kim scored to give the Padres their first lead of the game, but the umpires conferred, and determined that Wade had run outside the baseline, and thus Wade was called out.

The Giants had just caught a massive break, as the Padres sent in Jose Azocar to pinch-run for Profar at third. The Giants then played the infield in for Jackson Merrill, who hit a sharp ground ball to the right-side; second-baseman Thairo Estrada ranged to his right to grab it and fire a throw home to get Azocar at the plate for the second out. Bogaerts then popped up to shortstop Nick Ahmed on the first pitch to end the inning.

Jorge Soler walked to lead off the top of the sixth, and that knocked Darvish out of the game. Padres Manager Mike Shildt brought in the lefty, Tom Cosgrove. Melvin countered by pinch-hitting Wilmer Flores for LaMonte Wade, but Flores struck out swinging, and Cosgrove set down all three men he faced to end the inning.

Webb ran into trouble again in the bottom of the sixth. Tatis led off the inning with a base-hit to center, and very alertly went from first to third on a weak ground out between the pitcher’s mound and first off the bat of Jake Cronenworth. Webb got Machado to pop out to second, and then chose to put Kim on. Azocar then struck out swinging in his first plate appearance to end the inning.

That would do it for Webb, who threw 97 pitches over six innings. Webb set down the first nine men he faced, and faced the minimum through his first four innings. He gave up two runs in the fifth, but braved in there to go six.

“It was nice today to get out there and get the adrenaline going,” said Webb. “Even after I came out there were a lot of broken-bat base hits, not a lot of balls hit hard. That’s baseball, though. Sometimes baseball is cruel like that.”

The Padres brought in Johny Brito for the seventh. Estrada and Conforto singled to start the top of the seventh. Bailey then laid down a sacrifice bunt to move the runners over to second and third. That brought up Ahmed, who had the lone Giants’ RBI to this point, and Ahmed lined a single to left to score Estrada to tie the game.

Yuki Matsui, the left-hander whom the Padres had signed from Japan, was brought in to face Lee, who hit a sacrifice fly to center to knock in Conforto and put the Giants back ahead for his first major league RBI. However, Ahmed, who had advanced to second on a wild pitch by Matsui, got caught in a rundown between second and third after the throw from center-fielder Jackson Merrill was cut off, and was tagged out to end the inning.

Melvin brought in Luke Jackson for the bottom of the seventh, and Jackson gave up singles to Campusano and Wade to start the inning, which put runners on the corners with nobody out. With Merrill up, Wade took off for second, but Ahmed dropped the throw from Bailey, and the ball ricocheted into shallow left-center field, which allowed Campusano to score to tie the game and Wade to get to third. Jackson then walked Merrill, and left the game after he tweaked his back on the pitch.

Ryan Walker came in for Jackson, and the Padres kept going. Bogaerts singled to score Wade and give the Padres the lead. Tatis grounded out to third, but Cronenworth doubled to the wall in right to score two and extend the Padres’ lead to 6-3.

“Webby pitched his ass off. I wish we could’ve gotten him the [win],” said Jackson. “I felt great the whole outing and then, I think it was a fastball to Merrill, something happened. I tried to throw another pitch because it didn’t feel as bad as last year and had no idea where it was going. Other than that I felt fantastic. Nothing lingering from last year. Just one of those outings where I wish we could’ve gotten Webby the [win].”

Walker escaped the inning without any further damage, but the damage had been done, and the life was sucked out of the Giants, who went down 1-2-3 against Matsui in the top of the eighth.

Melvin then brought in the lefty Erik Miller for his major league debut. Miller pitched a 1-2-3 inning, and capped it off with a strike out of Eguy Roasario on a high fastball.

Robert Suarez came in for the ninth, and set down the first two men he faced. Conforto hit a home run to right-center to make it 6-4, but Bailey grounded out to second to end the game.

The Giants fall to 0-1, and while it is March 28, it always hurts to lose on Opening Day, because 1-0 looks a lot better than 0-1. This is the second-straight opening day loss for the Giants, and their fifth over the last six years.

The good news is that there are 161 of these things left, and Kyle Harrison will take the hill tomorrow night against Joe Musgrove. First pitch will be at 6:40 p.m.

News and Notes:

Despite a strong spring in which he hit .302, Luis Matos did not make the Opening Day roster. Less surprisingly, Marco Luciano, who had a rough spring, but turned things around during the final week of camp, did not make the roster either.

The Giants decided to carry three catchers, as Patrick Bailey, Tom Murphy and Joey Bart all made the Opening Day roster.

According to Alex Pavlovic, the Giants Beat Writer for NBC Sports Bay Area, Blake Snell was at Petco Park today for Opening Day, but will return to Scottsdale tomorrow to get work in, and could be ready to join the rotation as soon as the end of next week, when the Giants open the home part of their schedule against the Padres.

Jackson will undergo an MRI on his back. As of now, no roster move has been made.