Giants drop 6th game in row with 6-5 loss to Pirates

PITTSBURGH - The Giants needed to sit through a 93-minute rain delay before first pitch on Saturday at PNC Park.

They’ll need to wait until at least today to snap their losing streak.

The Giants’ skid hit six games after the club’s most reliable reliever, Tony Watson, allowed the go-ahead run in the eighth inning of a 6-5 loss. After Watson surrendered his first home run of the season in Friday’s blowout loss, he hit Pirates shortstop Jordy Mercer with the bases loaded in the eighth inning to bring in a run.

“Hitting a guy to get the game-winning run in, that’s unacceptable,” Watson said. “Especially after the inning the guys put up to fight back. After Jackson’s big hit, frustrating for sure.”

Pittsburgh’s ability to cash in against Watson crushed a Giants squad that scored a run in the seventh and one more in the eighth to tie the game 5-5.

Down 5-4 entering the eighth inning, center fielder Austin Jackson launched an RBI double off the top of the left-field wall against former Giant George Kontos to even the score, but Jackson barely missed a home run that would have pushed the club ahead.

“That thing just missed going out,” manager Bruce Bochy said. “That might have been the difference in the game, to be honest. He hit it well and it’s a shame.”

With Madison Bumgarner and Johnny Cueto on the disabled list, Jeff Samardzija is the most established active member of a staff that desperately needed him to reverse an ugly trend plaguing the Giants.

After their starters combined for just 22 innings the last time through the rotation, Samardzija was one strike away from logging a quality start and navigating through the heart of the Pirates’ order in a critical situation.

Then he left a fastball up in the zone and Francisco Cervelli crushed it.

The Pirates catcher broke a 3-3 tie with a two-run blast to right-center field in the sixth inning, ruining Samardzija’s night and forcing the Giants to play from behind the rest of the night.

“Us as a staff, us five guys have to find a way to improve and really get that momentum going and give that rhythm to the game to where the offense is feeling like they’re in the dugout a lot,” Samardzija said.

After recording 12 outs in his last start, Samardzija found himself in immediate trouble in the first inning of Saturday’s contest.

The right-hander allowed a Josh Bell sacrifice fly and two-out RBI single from Corey Dickerson as the Pirates jumped out to an early 2-0 lead. Falling behind early has crushed the Giants on their road trip, as the club has given up at least one first-inning run in seven of their nine games.

Despite the ominous start, the Giants forced their way back into the game in the top of the second when third baseman Evan Longoria slammed the first pitch of the inning over the left-field wall. Longoria’s team-leading eighth home run of the year halved the deficit, and former Pirate Alen Hanson evened the game at 2-2 with a one-out solo shot into the right-field bleachers.

A former top prospect in the Pirates’ organization, Hanson never hit a home run in 64 games with Pittsburgh.

His game-tying blast to right field marked his fourth of the year for the Giants.

After sweeping the Braves to kick off their road trip, the Giants led for just three full innings in their four-game set in Philadelphia and trailed from the outset of Friday’s 11-2 loss in Pittsburgh. An elusive opportunity to hold a lead presented itself for the Giants in the third inning when Brandon Crawford delivered an RBI sacrifice fly to plate Andrew McCutchen.

However, a one-out home run from Gregory Polanco knotted the score at 3-3 in the bottom of the frame, preventing Samardzija from notching a shutdown inning. After allowing home runs to Cervelli and Polanco on Saturday, Samardzija has given up 35 home runs in his last 37 starts.

Crawford nearly enjoyed a stunning reprisal of his grand slam that helped the Giants to victory in the 2014 National League wild-card game at PNC Park, but his fly ball was caught a few feet shy of the wall.

Trailing 5-3 in the seventh, McCutchen attempted to spark a rally with a leadoff double, his second of the game and his third of the series, in front of a crowd that stood and cheered for more than a minute when he was introduced on Saturday.

The Giants’ right fielder came around to score on a Brandon Belt two-out single, but Longoria grounded out to end the inning.

The 5? innings Samardzija tossed were his most in any of his five starts this season, but the Giants expect a pitcher who is coming off five consecutive 200-inning seasons to work deeper into games.

Though Samardzija dealt with a pectoral strain that sidelined him for three weeks to start the year, durability is less of a concern than command at this point in the season.

“It was 5? and five runs and that needs to be better,” Samardzija said. “Part of me needs to be positive in this game, but we’ll keep that to myself and it is what it is. Need to be better.”

In between Samardzija and Watson, right-hander Sam Dyson tossed 1? innings of scoreless ball as the Giants’ offense showed signs of life. In the end, Watson couldn’t pitch around a leadoff double by Josh Bell in the eighth as the Giants fell two games under .500.