Blade Tidwell Has Best MLB Start So Far But Giants Lose To Red Sox Anyway

The rookie tosses nearly six scoreless frames, but his effort is wasted as Boston rallies back in the ninth inning for a 3-2 walk-off win

San Francisco Giants mound conference | Credit: D. Ross Cameron | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

For San Francisco Giants starter Blade Tidwell, Saturday night's game against the Boston Red Sox represented another opportunity to earn a place in the team's rotation next season.

Coming off a start against Colorado that was rocky, he certainly answered the bell, throwing 5.2 innings of scoreless baseball, striking out seven batters and walking two. It was a short but dominating start, his best one ever, and enough to earn him a notch in the victory column.

That was the good news. Then the bottom of the ninth inning came, and that's when the bell tolled in Boston. With a 2-0 lead, Tidwell's team only needed three outs to secure the win. Instead, they surrendered three runs, as the Sox stole away what should have been a surefire win.

With the loss, the Giants fall to 52-77 and 23.5 games behind the two-time defending World Series Champions, the Los Angeles Dodgers, in their division. They are also incredibly close to falling into last place in the National West, as they have gone 3-7 in their last 10 games, and they are only two games ahead of annual also-rans, the Colorado Rockies, for a cold spot in the basement.

The last time the San Francisco Giants finished in last place in the NL West was 2017, when they finished an astonishing 40 games behind (you guessed it) the Dodgers.

The story should be how San Francisco's starter cemented his spot with a scoreless effort. Instead, it's another tragic ending to a game that should have been easily won. After fellow upstart Carson Seymour pitched 1.1 innings of scoreless relief, it went back to business as usual for the back of the bullpen. They blew yet another save. That's now 19 on the year.

Tidwell's Future is Bright

Giants manager Tony Vitello, conducting infield drills | Credit: Rhona Wise | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Despite the freaky finish, San Francisco fans have to be encouraged by what they saw out of the 25-year-old Tidwell, who has an incredible upside and played for manager Tony Vitello before the first-year skipper joined the Giants. TV coached the young hurler at the University of Tennessee.

Tidwell says he felt good about the performance and thought that he really set the tone right away by striking out the side in the first inning.

"Any time you do that, it sets the tone to the other team,” said Tidwell, according to a San Francisco Chronicle report by writer Susan Slusser. “I wanted to be the aggressor, not the one on the other side of that.”