Giants seek boost of energy after sweep by White Sox

SAN FRANCISCO -- It’s been a slog for the Giants lately, so much so that manager Gabe Kapler felt the need to call out the team’s flagging energy levels prior to Sunday afternoon’s series finale against the White Sox.

“I don’t think we’ve brought our best levels of energy to the ballpark over the course of the last couple of weeks,” Kapler said. “When that happens, I think it’s important to examine where we’re spending our energy.”

Rather than get worked up over circumstances out of their control, such as questionable calls from umpires, field conditions or the grueling schedule, Kapler challenged his team to focus on channeling their energy in a more positive way, namely by supporting teammates and raising the bar across the board.

“It’s not one person making the commitment to invest energy into our teammates and into this team,” Kapler said. “It’s everybody making that decision. Collectively, you can really change the energy quickly. It’s one of the things that we’ve been talking about in individual conversations, and one of the things that we feel like we can do to change the direction and do so quickly.”

The message still wasn’t enough to snap the Giants out of one of their worst skids in Kapler’s three-year tenure, though. San Francisco again looked lifeless in a 13-4 loss to the White Sox that sealed a three-game sweep at Oracle Park, continuing a precipitous backslide for a team that won a franchise-record 107 games last year.

Following a 2-6 homestand against three teams with losing records -- the Reds, Tigers and White Sox -- the Giants have now lost 10 of their last 13 games, slipping a season-high 8 1/2 games behind the first-place Dodgers in the National League West. They’ve tumbled out of the playoff picture altogether in recent weeks, dropping two games behind the Cardinals for the third and final NL Wild Card spot.

“I think it’s pretty obvious that the team’s energy, our play, whatever you want to call it, has not been up to our standards,” first baseman Brandon Belt said. “I think we need to be a little bit more proactive in maybe turning that around a little bit and getting things back on track.

“A lot of the time it’s just changing the attitude. We know what we need to do to go out there and play well. We’ve had a lot of times where we’ve been hit a little bit, especially with injuries, but that’s part of the game. It’s not going to be a perfect season for us, but we’ve still got to go up there and win ballgames. We’ve got a team capable of doing that.”

Many of the issues that have plagued the Giants throughout the season -- woeful defense, an inconsistent offense and mounting injury concerns -- surfaced again on Sunday.

With Anthony DeSclafani heading for season-ending surgery on his right ankle, the Giants attempted to plug their hole in the rotation with a bullpen game, though the afternoon ended with catcher Austin Wynns on the mound in the top of the ninth after the White Sox opened up an 11-1 lead.

Donovan Walton, the only healthy shortstop on the active roster now that Brandon Crawford (left knee inflammation) and Thairo Estrada (COVID-19) are on the injured list, botched a potential double-play ball with one out in the third, and the White Sox capitalized, scoring two unearned runs on Luis Robert’s two-out bloop single off Sean Hjelle. Chicago later surged to a 6-0 lead behind a three-run fifth inning that was sparked by Andrew Vaughn, who reached on an infield single after Wilmer Flores airmailed a throw to first base.

The Giants, who rank 29th in the Majors with -29 outs above average, have repeatedly paid for sloppy fielding this year, going 26-14 when they commit no errors and 14-23 when they make at least one miscue.

The offense, meanwhile, collected only three hits through the first eight innings, with White Sox right-hander Lucas Giolito striking out seven of the first eight batters he faced. The Giants finally got on the board after Austin Slater singled and scored on Joc Pederson’s RBI double off the right-field wall in the sixth. They added three more runs in the ninth on a trio of RBI doubles from Flores, Mike Yastrzemski and Darin Ruf, but it was too little, too late.

“We didn’t play good baseball,” Kapler said. “We didn’t make enough pitches. We didn’t string together enough at-bats. We didn’t play good enough defense.”

The Giants will attempt to right the ship as they head to Arizona to kick off a seven-game road trip against the D-backs and Padres, but if they continue to veer off course and fade from contention, they could be in danger of pivoting from buyers to sellers at the Aug. 2 Trade Deadline.

“We’re working through it,” Kapler said. “This is a group that as individuals and collectively have experienced adversity before. This is not new. It’s a challenge that I think we all take very seriously. We’re not going to get bent out of shape and get super low because we all individually and collectively experienced adversity before. This is part of baseball.”