Verlander's hard-luck season continues despite strongest start yet

SAN FRANCISCO -- When Justin Verlander takes the mound for the Giants, the universe seems to conspire against him.

He’s received the second-lowest run support of any starting pitcher in the Majors this year. He’s routinely had to pitch around errors. And far too often, he’s been forced to watch the Giants’ bullpen blow late leads.

The latest and perhaps most painful collapse came on Saturday night, when the Giants squandered Verlander’s best performance of the year in a 2-1 loss to the Rays that pushed the club’s losing streak to a season-high seven games.

The 42-year-old Verlander turned back the clock to strike out eight over a season-high seven scoreless innings, but he was denied the win after the Giants couldn’t hold a one-run lead in the eighth.

With setup man Ryan Walker on paternity leave, the Giants brought in José Buttó to relieve Verlander, who departed after throwing 88 pitches. Buttó got two quick outs, but he hit No. 9 hitter Nick Fortes and then watched the Rays rally for a 2-1 lead behind three consecutive singles from Chandler Simpson, Yandy Díaz and Brandon Lowe.

Jung Hoo Lee led off the bottom of the ninth with a single and stole second to get into scoring position with two outs, but pinch-hitter Wilmer Flores struck out against Tampa Bay closer Pete Fairbanks to end it, sealing the Giants’ 15th loss in their last 16 games at Oracle Park.

San Francisco’s bullpen ranks second in the Majors with a 3.30 ERA, but the unit has coughed up leads in six of Verlander’s 21 starts this year, an unbelievable stretch that helps explain why the three-time Cy Young winner has recorded only one win for the Giants.

“Literally a hard-luck pitcher this year,” manager Bob Melvin said. “It was his best stuff of the year. He’s pitched really well here in the last month. But that was really as good as he’s pitched.”

It’s been a trying season for Verlander, who has made almost no headway in his quest for 300 wins, though he’s been encouraged by the results he’s been seeing on the mound recently. He held the Rays to two hits and walked none on Saturday, topping out at 96 mph with his four-seam fastball and generating 14 swinging strikes. While he’s only 1-9 on the season, Verlander has pitched to a 2.00 ERA over his past five starts and appears intent on showing that he has some gas left in the tank beyond this year.

“I feel like the last month has been much better,” Verlander said. “I look at the velo and the fastball and the shapes with all my pitches. I knew stuff-wise that it’s pretty damn close, if not identical, to three years ago, when I won the Cy Young. I feel like there’s really kind of a minute small thing that needs to be adjusted. Hopefully if you find that, you just go from there. I hope that this is that. I know today was by far the most at ease I’ve felt on the mound.”

While Verlander has struggled to pile up wins, he’s still been busy climbing up other leaderboards. He currently ranks 10th with 3,511 career strikeouts and is only five away from passing Hall of Famer Walter Johnson for ninth on the all-time list, though a discrepancy in the record books led to an odd moment in the fifth inning on Saturday.

Baseball Reference has Johnson with 3,509 strikeouts, which prompted the Giants’ scoreboard operators to flash a congratulatory message when Verlander punched out Ha-Seong Kim looking with a sweeper to record his 3,510th career K. Giants fans rose to their feet to give Verlander a standing ovation for taking sole possession of ninth place, but their celebration appears to have been a bit premature.

Turns out, the Elias Sports Bureau -- the official statistician of Major League Baseball -- actually credits Johnson with 3,515 strikeouts, leaving him ahead of Verlander for now.

“I guess the guy keeping track back then was [doing it] by hand,” Verlander quipped. “I guess I’m in limbo.”