Even if SF Giants’ rotation is ‘best in baseball,’ can it lead them to the postseason?

CINCINNATI — Before Blake Snell took the mound Friday night, Bob Melvin was asked if there was any doubt in his mind that the two-time Cy Young winner would even be pitching in a Giants uniform after Tuesday’s trade deadline.

“It never crossed my desk that we were going to trade him,” the Giants’ manager said. “I’m sure there were a million calls on him, but I never really got the feeling that we were going to trade him.”

While president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi listened to offers, none apparently were serious enough to consider harshing the manager’s vibe by raising the possibility of trading one of his top starters, who had just begun to round into the form they had waited months to witness.

Only hours later, Zaidi’s discerning strategy paid off as Snell authored the Giants’ 10th no-hitter since moving to San Francisco in a brilliant 114-pitch effort to beat the Reds, 3-0. In fact, the thinking by the club’s top decision maker to ride their starting rotation altogether is looking pretty smart after accounting for Logan Webb’s complete game shutout two nights prior.

“Off to a good start,” Melvin smiled Saturday afternoon.

Webb and Snell became the first pair of teammates to toss back-to-back shutouts since Adam Wainwright and Shelby Miller did so for the Cardinals on May 10-11, 2013. It hadn’t been done by two Giants pitchers since Jason Schmidt and Liván Hernández in 2002.

Both those teams eventually went on to claim the National League pennant before eventually losing in the World Series.

Coincidence?

“Oh, wow,” Melvin said, tapping his bat on the dugout bench. “Well, we have that to look forward to.”

Realistically, both teams were better positioned than these Giants by this point in the year, even with a smaller postseason field. The 2002 Giants were 10 games over .500 and a game out of the lone wild card spot. The 2013 Cardinals were playing at a 95-win pace and went on to capture the NL Central.

Melvin has said the Giants’ playoff hopes begin with getting back to .500, which they will try to do behind Kyle Harrison on Saturday for the first time since they were 29-29 on the last day of May. Only one thing left for the rookie lefty to do after Webb tossed one shutout and Snell one-upped him with a no-hitter.

“At least throw another shutout, right?” Melvin joked.

More seriously, he continued, “You’re not going to get too many complete games like that, but especially for the younger guys — (Hayden) Birdsong and Harry — it’s like, ‘Hey, these things are doable.’ I think everybody wants to pass the baton and move forward. It’s a lot to ask for a guy like Harry to go nine innings, but here recently he’s been a lot more efficient and, for me, on his way to pitching a little bit deeper in games.”

Fewer and fewer starters are pitching deep into games these days as the game trends toward specialization and maximization. Snell might be the perfect embodiment of the modern pitcher; finishing off his no-hitter, he recorded more outs in the eighth and ninth inning (six) than he had in 201 previous career starts combined (five).

Snell became the third pitcher to throw a no-hitter this season, and it is becoming increasingly exclusive company to even complete nine innings. The pair of Giants pitchers became the 22nd and 23rd to toss complete games this season, putting MLB on pace for its fewest on record with the exception of the 60-game 2020 season.

As recently as 2015, the year before Snell broke in, there were 104 instances of pitchers going the distance. The final full season of Melvin’s playing career, in 1993, featured 371, or more than 10 times the league is on pace for this year.

All that to say, the Giants’ starting pitching — as good as it might be — can only take them so far.

Since Snell’s return to the rotation on July 9, the group has just about lived up to Zaidi’s billing as “the best in baseball.” Their starters’ 2.96 ERA over that span ranks first in the National League, trailing only the Mariners (2.40) and Rays (2.44).

Their bats, however, have produced four total runs while picking up their past two wins, and dating back to the day of Snell’s first start back, they have been held to four or fewer in 14 of their 20 games. Despite possessing the best rotation in the National League, they went just 11-9, far off the pace it will require to leapfrog four teams and make up the four-game deficit for the final wild card spot they faced entering Saturday’s game.

“You’re not going to get too many complete games like that,” Melvin said. “That part of it is probably going to be hard to replicate. But coming out of the deadline, and a lot of talk about our rotation, to get off to a good start like that, it’s a nice feeling.”