{"id":703858,"date":"2026-05-20T09:21:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T09:21:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/703858\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T09:21:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T09:21:17","slug":"tony-vitello-takes-blame-for-giants-walk-off-loss-to-d-backs-nbc-sports-bay-area-california","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/703858\/","title":{"rendered":"Tony Vitello takes blame for Giants\u2019 walk-off loss to D-backs \u2013 NBC Sports Bay Area & California"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Giants escaped jam after jam on Tuesday night at Chase Field, but the Arizona Diamondbacks finally got the best of them to deliver San Francisco a heartbreaking 5-3 loss<\/a> in walk-off fashion.<\/p>\n

Left-hander Matt Gage<\/a> was the Giants’ fifth pitcher of the game when he entered to face Ketel Marte with two outs and two on in the bottom of the ninth — and it took just two pitches for the D-backs second baseman to crush a game-ending, three-run home run into left field.<\/p>\n

After the brutal loss, manager Tony Vitello blamed himself for his bullpen management in the ninth, which also included a crucial catcher’s interference call on Daniel Susac that brought the switch-hitting Marte to the plate.<\/p>\n

“At that point [Caleb] Kilian had 25 pitches,” Vitello told reporters after the loss. “Went with a fresh arm, different look, and made the wrong decision, cost us the game. Not that Gage — I mean, he’s got as good of numbers as anybody on our team, and he’s gotten it done for us more times than not, but obviously it’s on me.”<\/p>\n

Hindsight is 20\/20, of course, and Marte’s ability to hit from either side of the plate presented Vitello with a difficult decision. It’s worth noting that all five of Marte’s homers entering Tuesday’s game had come off righties — though he has hit better for average from the right side of the plate. So, Vitello opted to replace the right-handed Kilian with Gage to face the veteran infielder.<\/p>\n

In the previous inning, Kilian induced a double play to escape a bases-loaded jam in what was one of many high-leverage moments for the bullpen.<\/p>\n

Before the Giants’ defense backed up Kilian in the eighth, they did the same for Keaton Winn in the seventh to keep their lead intact.<\/p>\n

Landen Roupp went six strong innings Tuesday, surrendering just one run on seven hits with three strikeouts in his first quality start since April 26. The defense was lights-out a majority of the night, save for a first-inning blunder where a Luis Arraez throw bounced off Corbin Carroll’s head and allowed him to score.<\/p>\n

Rafael Devers had himself a game before things went awry, blasting a second-inning home run as he went back to back with Willy Adames, and putting on a defensive clinic at first base by recording all three outs in the sixth.<\/p>\n

Despite those positives, one devastating swing of the bat gave San Francisco a series loss. And the Giants didn’t do enough in the batter’s box themselves, posting a measly 0-for-8 mark with runners in scoring position on the night.<\/p>\n

After missing out on his sixth win of the 2026 MLB season, Roupp kept things in perspective with a simple message as the Giants fell to 20-29.<\/p>\n

“It’s pretty unfortunate, but just got to move on and come out tomorrow and play better baseball,” Roupp said.<\/p>\n

Download and follow the Giants Talk Podcast<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Giants escaped jam after jam on Tuesday night at Chase Field, but the Arizona Diamondbacks finally got…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703859,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2290],"tags":[5,39821,2005,863,1870],"class_list":["post-703858","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-baseball","tag-baseball","tag-caleb-kilian","tag-landen-roupp","tag-rafael-devers","tag-tony-vitello"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116606172104982012","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703858","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703858"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703858\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703858"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703858"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}