Giants waste Robbie Ray's sharp start, lose to White Sox

Jerry McDonald, Bay Area News Group on Jun 28, 2025

Published in Baseball

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The Giants continue to tread water in the National League West, falling, 1-0, on the road Saturday to the Chicago White Sox with the bats for the most part staying silent in the 11 games since the trade for designated hitter Rafael Devers.

An excellent outing by starting pitcher Robbie Ray went for naught with the Giants getting handcuffed by Chicago starter Adrian Houser and reliever Grant Taylor.

The Giants, hopeful of rectifying a 3-6 homestand with a potentially favorable road trip to Chicago, Arizona and finally Sacramento, fell to 45-38 after winning the series opener Friday night. Chicago, which has nine rookies on the roster and could have its third straight season of 100 or more losses, are 26-57.

Andrew Benintendi drove in the lone run for Chicago with a solo home run in the sixth inning, his 10th of the season, against Ray.

Ray (8-3) got the last out of the inning and was done for the day, giving up one run on four hits with two walks and six strikeouts. Ray threw 101 pitches, 64 of them strikes.

Houser (3-2), who threw seven innings for the first time since 2023 when he was with the Milwaukee Brewers, gave up four hits with a walk and five strikeouts. He was replaced by Taylor in the eighth inning, who worked the last two innings for his second save. Taylor retired all six batters he faced.

Devers finished 0 for 4 and struck out twice.

The Giants did next to nothing until the sixth inning when No. 9 hitter Brett Wisely singled, with leadoff batter Christian Koss also hitting a single.

Houser worked the count to 0-2 on Devers, then balked the runners to second and third. Then disaster struck. Houser struck out Devers, with catcher Edwin Quero picking off Wisely off third base on strike three — yet another Giants baserunning error.

Houser retired Heliot Ramos on a fly to center for the third out, capping an inning where the Giants had runners at second and third with their best hitters coming to the plate and ending up with nothing to show for it.

The White Sox failed to add another run in the seventh against Erik Miller when Michael A. Taylor narrowly missed a home run that bounced off the top of the fence, and then was called out at the plate on a single by Josh Rojas when he failed to touch home plate. Catcher Andrew Knizner alertly applied the tag after a strong throw from Mike Yastrzemski.

NOTES

— Former Giants outfielder Austin Slater robbed Jung Hoo Lee of extra bases with a leaping catch in right field for the third out of the second inning. Lee came in hitting just .125 (7 for 56) with two RBIs in his previous 16 games.

Lee countered with a sliding catch of his own in center field to take extra bases from Josh Rojas with a runner on third.

— Justin Verlander (0-5) is still in search of his first win as a Giant and 263rd of his career as the Giants close out the series Sunday in Chicago.