Bounces go Lucas Giolito's way as Padres beat Athletics

Jeff Sanders, The San Diego Union-Tribune on May 24, 2026

Published in Baseball

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SAN DIEGO — Lucas Giolito expects to throw harder as he wades into the season. He expects to throw better, too.

He was just good enough Saturday.

Giolito danced in and out of trouble through five shutout innings in his second start as a San Diego Padre, his offense was more patient than potent and that was a formula that managed to work in a 2-0 win over the Athletics in front of a sellout crowd of 42,616 at Petco Park.

The Padres managed just two hits in the win — their first with two or fewer hits since June 2017 — but none of them plated runs as a hit-by-pitch with the bases loaded got them on the board in J.T. Ginn’s wild second inning and Ty France tacked on an RBI groundout in the third

The narrow margin didn’t faze Giolito.

Nor did a heck of a lot of traffic as he sidestepped nine baserunners and the Padres’ victory formation — Jeremiah Estrada, Adrián Morejón, Jason Adam and Mason Miller — covered the final four innings. Miller’s NL-leading 16th save via a perfect ninth was at the expense of an Athletics team that traded him to the Padres at last year’s deadline.

The start was the 31-year-old Giolito’s second since joining the Padres rotation on Sunday in Seattle. He threw four shutout innings in that debut before allowing three runs in the fifth inning of an 8-3 win in which he averaged 90.4 mph with his four-seamer, about 3 mph lower than last year.

Giolito sat a tick below that on Saturday — 90.2 mph — as his velocity dipped as low 87.6 mph in the fourth inning, but he made up for it in savviness and some BABIP luck.

After all, Giolito walked five in five innings, allowed four hits and somehow did not allow any of those baserunners past third base.

Give France a big assist as he was part of three double plays that helped Giolito out of each of the last three innings he pitched.

In the third inning, after a leadoff walk, Nick Kurtz bounced a ball to first base that France snagged and tagged the runner retreating to first base before stepping on the bag.

In the fourth, Giolito walked the first two batters, got a pop-up and then walked another before getting Jeff McNeil to ground another ball to France. This time, the Gold Glover threw immediately to second base for the second out and got back to first base in time for Sung-Mun Song’s throw to record the final out of the inning.

Darell Hernaiz led off the fifth with a single and was immediately doubled up at first base on Carlos Cortes’ lineout to France. Giolito gave up another single to Kurtz but escaped a scoreless fifth inning with a pop-up of Shea Langeliers to hand a 2-0 lead to the Padres bullpen.

Giolito threw 47 of his 86 pitches for strikes in putting himself in position to win a second straight start to begin his Padres tenure.

The Padres didn’t collect their first hit until after Ginn had exited.

The Athletics’ right-hander walked six batters and hit another — Fernando Tatis Jr. with the bases loaded in the second — but hadn’t allowed a hit when he was pulled with one out in the third inning with just 40 of his 73 pitches landing for strikes.

Jackson Merrill, in the lineup for the first time since leaving Wednesday’s game with back discomfort, greeted reliever left-hander Jose Suarez with a double.

France’s ensuing groundout opened a 2-0 lead.