'He's not perfect': Gallen allows five runs in rare stumble

SAN FRANCISCO -- It’s usually a pretty good bet that if you give Zac Gallen an early lead, the D-backs' right-hander is going to take it from there. So when Christian Walker drove home a run in the top of the first inning, it seemed to be a good sign for Arizona.

Saturday’s game, though, didn’t necessarily add up with Gallen allowing five earned runs on nine hits across five innings and suffering his first loss of the year despite feeling like he threw the ball well.

The bottom line was a 7-3 win by the Giants over the D-backs, who are still looking to put together a stretch of good baseball early in the season.

“There were some misses [with location],” D-backs manager Torey Lovullo said. “And they hit some good pitches. Zac goes out there and competes as good as anybody we have and the fastball velocity looked like it was coming out hot. You gotta give the Giants' hitters credit, they waited for something that was out over the plate, and they handled pretty well. He's not perfect and he's gonna have days like that. On these days, we’ve got to pick him up. Of course we didn't do that.”

The D-backs' offense got that run in the first and two in the fourth to tie the game at 3, but other than that they were pretty quiet, compiling just one hit against the San Francisco bullpen over the final five innings.

“We were presented with a challenge today and we didn't get the job done,” Lovullo said.

It was a tough day at the plate for outfielder Corbin Carroll, who went 0-for-4 with three strikeouts to drop his OPS on the season to .609.

In his 2023 rookie year, Carroll spoiled the D-backs by immediately having success out of the gate. He started in the All-Star Game, won National League Rookie of the Year and was a big reason the D-backs made it to the World Series.

It’s been a struggle for him at the plate to open this year and the D-backs are confident that he will make the necessary adjustments to get going again, but his frustration is evident.

“Maybe pitch selection,” Lovullo said of what could be causing the struggles. “You know, trying to make adjustments in the wrong place and in the wrong space. Being athletic and just going out there and competing is a challenge for everybody and that'll be my challenge to Corbin. Just go up there and react to the baseball. We're all seeing the same thing and the body language isn't great. It’s a hard game and he's being challenged right now, but he's gonna figure it out.”

As for Gallen, who struck out six and walked one, he just never seemed to be able to settle into a rhythm. He allowed two runs in the first inning, one coming off a leadoff homer to Jung Hoo Lee, then allowed a two-out double to Patrick Bailey in the third.

It was Bailey’s bobblehead day at the park and he delivered what was the decisive blow in the fifth when his homer off Gallen sailed over the right-field wall and landed in a kayak floating in McCovey Cove.

It led to a frustrating afternoon for Gallen.

“Yeah, I mean just a lot of soft contact early,” he said. “I feel like I had better stuff than the line showed. Even the [Bailey] homer, I didn’t really think was a mistake, he just put a good swing on a solid pitch. I missed my spot, but it’s a spot I felt like I could miss. Who knows, a different game maybe the soft contact gets outs.”