Giants' Bochy set for one last game vs. Padres

Retiring San Francisco Giants skipper Bruce Bochy will manage one last time against his former team, the San Diego Padres, when the National League West clubs conclude a four-game series Sunday afternoon at Oracle Park in San Francisco.

The 64-year-old Bochy, who played nine major league seasons, including five for the Padres, began his 25-year managerial career with San Diego, where he went 951-975. He took the Padres to the 1998 World Series, where they were swept by the New York Yankees.

Bochy began his 13-year San Francisco run in 2007, and will take a 1,041-1,038 record as a Giant into Sunday's game. He's a three-time World Series champion with the Giants, leading the team to titles in 2010, '12 and '14.

Bochy needs eight wins in the Giants' final 27 games to reach 2,000 for his career. His current record is 1,992-2,013.

The veteran manager will get a chance to pull additional strings on Sunday as major league rosters can expand from 25 to as many as 40 players.

The Giants, while still making a long-shot run at a wild-card berth, are also expected to try to get Pablo Sandoval one final 2019 at-bat before leaving on a trip following Sunday's game.

Sandoval is scheduled for season-ending -- and perhaps career-ending -- Tommy John surgery next week.

Bochy admitted before Saturday's game that, while he won't be around to manage next season, the Giants have to at least be thinking in part about 2020 as the calendar flips to September.

"These are important games for all of us," he insisted to reporters, "as far as showing what they're capable of doing, giving us a true evaluation what we have."

Padres manager Andy Green noted Saturday he welcomes pitching reinforcements. It's possible one of his new guys will start as early as Tuesday in Arizona.

"It's going to be a lot better for us," he said before three of his pitchers held the Giants to one run in a 4-1 win Saturday night. "The staff still feels what we did three days ago. There's a residual impact of running through 10 innings with your bullpen."

Padres left-hander Eric Lauer (7-8, 4.48 ERA) and Giants veteran righty Jeff Samardzija (9-10, 3.38) form the pitching matchup Sunday in a duel of pitchers whose records in August don't exactly match their ERAs.

Lauer went 2-0 in five appearances last month, but sported a 4.32 ERA. Samardzija was only 1-2 across his five August outings, but his ERA was 1.84 as he gave up two runs in one start and one run in each of the other four last month.

Lauer has beaten the Giants in two earlier head-to-heads this season, giving him a 2-0 lifetime record against them with a 3.68 ERA in six games (five starts).

Samardzija is 9-3 with a 3.28 ERA over 20 games (18 starts) against the Padres. The nine wins are the most for Samardzija against one team in his career. This season, he is 1-0 with a 1.42 ERA over three starts against San Diego.

A win Sunday would allow the Padres to win the four-game series, though the Giants have already captured the season series with a 10-8 lead.

--Field Level Media