Justin Verlander earns more unwanted Giants history in ugly loss at Toronto
Rogers Centre holds fond memories for Verlander; it's where he's thrown two of his three no-hitters. But on this night, the ballpark fueled stuff of nightmares. The mechanical tweak that helped create the deception he wanted didn't pan out against Toronto, which got him for four runs on nine hits over 2⅔ innings.
The mechanical tweak still yielded higher velocities than he had previously; he averaged 94.5 mph on his four-seamer and topped out at 97 mph. But he lacked the right movement on his breaking ball, and the Blue Jays pounced in a four-run second inning.
The rally began with Addison Barger's single that bounced off Verlander's glove, then Alejandro Kirk hit a first-pitch slider through the right-side gap. Joey Loperfido's double down the first-base line scored the first run. Then Will Wagner doubled on a curveball to right to score two more. Nathan Lukes' RBI single made it 4-0 and Verlander wound up throwing 33 pitches in the inning.
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With that, Verlander's streak of 16 straight games without a win in a single season is the longest by a Giant, passing Matt Cain's 15 straight in 2017. One more winless start, and he will tie Mark Davis (spanning 1984-86) for longest overall winless stretch by a Giants starter. Verlander struck out no batters and walked two.
As usual, the Giants' offense fell flat. They had 10 hits off Toronto starter Chris Bassitt but came up empty. Rafael Devers and Matt Chapman hit into double plays in the first and second innings to extinguish two early scoring opportunities, and the team went 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position.
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