The arithmetic
The Giants cannot lose 100 games. Their floor is one game better than 1985.
San Francisco is 63-89 with ten games to play, so the worst record it can finish with is 63-99 and a second hundred-loss season is off the table. The league's year-by-year record for this franchise runs 144 seasons and contains exactly one hundred-loss year: 1985, at 62-100. The distance between that team and this year's floor is one game. Four seasons in the 144 have a worse winning percentage than a 63-99 finish, three of them played in New York. Across the 69 seasons the Giants have played in San Francisco, the best available outcome, winning all ten, is 73-89 and the eleventh-worst season in that span; losing seven of the ten produces 66-96, which is the 1984 club's record exactly. Tuesday's nine starters were Cox, Eldridge, Gilbert, Lee, Basabe, Hill, Cavanaugh, McCray and Koss. Turner Hill drove in three on a single, a groundout and the first home run of his major league life. Seven of the ten runs scored without a home run. Rafael Devers had core-muscle surgery in Philadelphia the same day. One take filed.
Grant Lombard·Sep 16, 2026·5 min readRead