Getting swept by the Miami Marlins at home wasn’t an ideal way for the Giants to hit the midpoint of the 2025 MLB season.
But in Game 82 of 162, San Francisco started the second half strong, getting back to their primary strengths in a 3-1 win over the Chicago White Sox on Friday night at Rate Field.
On “Giants Postgame Live,” NBC Sports Bay Area’s Laura Britt asked catcher Patrick Bailey about San Francisco’s keys for the remainder of the season.
“I think it’s going to get back to just timely hitting, kind of situational, getting the job done, just putting together quality ABs,” Bailey explained. “Obviously, our pitching has been huge in the first half. I think that’s going to be one of our strengths in the second half as well. I think we’ve got a lot of stuff to clean up defensively and baserunning.
“But that being said, I think we have a lot better baseball to play, and I think we’re in a pretty good spot right now.”
Appropriately, Bailey played a huge part in both main keys to success Friday night.
Though his offense has largely underwhelmed this year, Bailey continues to make a difference behind the plate, helping guide a Giants pitching staff that is among MLB’s best from front to back.
Starter Landen Roupp has struggled on the road in 2025, but the 26-year-old righty delivered one of his better outings on the South Side. In 5 1/3 innings, Roupp gave up just one unearned run to pick up his sixth win of the season.
Following San Francisco’s tried-and-true formula dating back to its early-2010s dynasty, manager Bob Melvin then turned the ball over to his league-leading bullpen. Ryan Walker, Randy Rodriguez, Tyler Rogers and Camilo Doval combined for 3 2/3 hitless innings to shut the door and end the Giants’ losing streak.
But, as Bailey noted, pitching typically wasn’t an issue in the first half, and it doesn’t project to be in the second half, either.
San Francisco’s hitting, on the other hand, has been far more inconsistent; the team particularly struggled with runners in scoring position during its last homestand.
Even though the Giants went just 2-for-9 with RISP on Friday, Bailey gave them just enough at the plate. He came up with that timely hit — the eventual game-winning knock — a two-run triple in the top of the sixth inning.
After the game, Melvin underscored the importance of Bailey’s clutch hit at a time when the Giants can’t find many.
“When we get a big hit like that now, it’s huge, especially in a game like that where one at bat could dictate the course of the game,” Melvin told reporters postgame. “Earlier in the season, we were really good in a lot of those situations, and we haven’t been [lately], but to get that one right there obviously was the biggest hit of the game.”
Those situations are particularly important for San Francisco, which leads MLB with 54 games (out of 82) decided by two runs or fewer this season.
Friday night, of course, was no exception. But, as Giants fans learned well during their World Series runs, elite pitching, combined with timely hitting, can take you far.
And once again, that’s the formula for San Francisco in 2025.