Fitzgerald HRs his way to history: 'Feels pretty good'

LOS ANGELES -- Perhaps nobody in baseball used the All-Star break downtime to his advantage like Giants rookie Tyler Fitzgerald, who now has a home run in five consecutive games for San Francisco.

Fitzgerald’s latest homer came in the second inning of Tuesday's 5-2 loss to the Dodgers, a drive to left field against another rookie in Los Angeles right-hander Landon Knack.

Fitzgerald's five-game homer streak is the longest by any Giants rookie all-time, giving the 26-year-old a spot in franchise lore ... though he wasn't feeling triumphant afterward.

(The last Giants player to hit a home run in five consecutive games was Barry Bonds, who had eight homers in a seven-game span in 2004.)

"At the end of the day, we come here to win,” Fitzgerald said. “Everything that I do is cool and all, and at the end of the year I’ll look back on this and smile about it. It will be cool. But we lost the game, so not a whole lot of good came from it. Hope to get a win tomorrow.”

Fitzgerald, whose homer on Monday came against Dodgers left-hander Ryan Yarbrough, had just two home runs in 35 games before the break and now has six on the season and eight in 49 career games.

"There are a lot of people in the organization, in development, that feel this way about him ... that it’s just a matter of time. Get some experience and get some consistent at-bats, that this could happen here,” Giants manager Bob Melvin said.

Fitzgerald's current streak started with a homer on July 9 against Toronto and continued with two more in consecutive games at Colorado over the weekend, prior to the series in Los Angeles.

But isn’t just the home runs that have been impressive. After going deep in his first at-bat on Tuesday, Fitzgerald worked a two-out walk on four pitches in the fourth inning. In the ninth, he drove in the Giants' second run of the game on a single, starting a rally that eventually put the tying run at first base.

Ultimately, Dodgers relievers Alex Vesia and Evan Phillips wiggled out of the jam, with LaMonte Wade Jr. grounding out to second base against Phillips to end the game and send San Francisco to a 1-4 start out of the break.

"It’s frustrating,” Melvin said. “We need to do a little bit more damage early on, create some traffic, take some pitches, get some guys on base. We had our best at-bats off Vesia late in the game, [who] is a tough guy.

"We’ve been taking good at-bats against late relievers all year, but we need to be able to get some better at-bats early in the game."

Quiet by nature, Fitzgerald is saying plenty in the leadership department with his bat, and even his play at shortstop. But given his offensive exploits, he's not about to get complacent.

"I try not to think about it, to be honest with you,” Fitzgerald said of his homer streak. “I’m seeing it well and swinging at good pitches and doing damage when I get the pitch I want. It’s cool and all, but I’m just trying to keep my head down, keep working and not really think about everything that is kind of going on.”

While the texts are flowing into Fitzgerald’s phone from well-meaning supporters, he is trying to normalize the situation as much as possible. The fact that he has been able to have so much success with fewer than 50 games of Major League experience is a feat unto itself.

"We have [to face Tyler] Glasnow tomorrow, so I’m not going to get ahead of myself here,” Fitzgerald said upon learning that Bonds’ 2004 run was seven games. “But just to get to five is pretty cool. I’ve had similar stretches like this in the Minor Leagues, but to finally just do it here is a sigh of relief. It feels pretty good."

Elsewhere on Tuesday, right-hander Jordan Hicks was unable to find that same feeling in what might have been his final start of the season. Hicks lasted just 3 2/3 innings, allowing four runs on a night the team could have used as many innings as possible to save the bullpen with left-hander Robbie Ray making his Giants debut Wednesday.

Depending on how Ray's first start with the club pans out, there remains a chance Hicks could start one more time before settling into a relief role.

"Whether we make this next start or don’t, we’ll have a good game plan on how this looks in the bullpen,” Hicks said. “There are no firm decisions right now. We’ll have a firm discussion, maybe tomorrow, and talk about it and see what’s up."