For Carlos Rodón, Tuesday's outing against the Arizona Diamondbacks was a black eye -- for multiple reasons -- on an otherwise stellar 2022 season.
Not only did Rodón and the Giants lose their sixth straight game, but the All-Star lefty surrendered five earned runs and made headlines for two incidents in the dugout where his emotions got the better of him.
After surrendering a two-run home run in the top of the second inning, Rodón was seen slamming his glove into the dugout bench out of frustration. Three innings later, Rodón walked off the field after the bottom of the fifth and kicked a bat that was propped up in the dugout, with the bat flying and hitting second baseman Thairo Estrada in the shin.
Stay in the game with the latest updates on your beloved Bay Area and California sports teams! Sign up here for our All Access Daily newsletter.
Rodón immediately regretted his actions, going over to check on Estrada who was surrounded by teammates in the dugout.
In speaking to reporters after the game, Rodón vehemently condemned his own actions, taking full accountability.
"I came in, kicked a bat, unacceptable action," Rodón told reporters. "Hit my teammate, probably the nicest teammate on the team. Just a selfish action that is unacceptable and cannot happen and I take all (responsibility), I take every amount of it. That cannot happen, I just feel stupid, really stupid."
San Francisco Giants
"Just angry," Rodón added. "Angry with myself. I made a selfish action and kicked a bat that had no reason to be kicked, the bat didn't do nothing, Thairo didn't do nothing. If anything, I should be hitting myself. Stupid."
Giants manager Gabe Kapler discussed the incident, telling reporters that the team will work with Rodón to make sure it doesn't happen again.
"He feels terrible about it, obviously," Kapler said postgame. "You saw that right away that he felt remorse about it. He knows it's unacceptable. We talked about it after the game, it just can't happen. It doesn't matter if it's Thairo or anybody else, these are his teammates and if he's not able to maintain control in those situations, somebody could get hurt. He knows it, we're working on it. We're going to work on ways to be in control in those situations.
"That doesn't mean he won't show emotion, that's totally fine that's part of the game and being angry about an outing or a specific event in an outing, totally fine. But when teammates and coaches are at risk, it just can't happen. We discussed it, we're going to work through it and we're going to support him through it and as I mentioned, he's fully accountable and understands that it can't happen."
Rodón admitted that the second-inning homer and the three-run blast surrendered in the bottom of the third were what triggered his frustrations initially and that he wanted to right the ship after he and the team's recent struggles.
"I just held onto the frustration from the two innings prior. It's not the right way to go about it, that's for sure."
"The last two starts have not gone great and we haven't played great and I just wanted to come out and get a win for the boys and it totally shot back and I did something even stupider."
Estrada spoke to reporters after the game, revealing that Rodón did apologize to him but was not willing to discuss the incident any further.
Wilmer Flores, who could be seen in the clip reacting to the incident in real-time, does not believe that the Giants will need to discuss it as a team any further.
Losers of six straight games, and falling below .500 for the first time since the end of the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, the Giants are free-falling out of the NL Wild Card race. Frustrations clearly are high and Kapler recognizes that both Rodón and the team are frustrated in general.
"There's Carlos' frustration which was clear and evident in that moment and then there's just the group's frustration," Kapler said. "The way that's coming out right now is that players are just a little bit tight and wanting to do a lot in every at-bat and every pitch perfectly and these things tend to snowball a little bit, but we gotta get it right back under control and understand that tomorrow is time to get back to work, talk through these things, not brush them under the rug and be accountable for them."
RELATED: Bonds being denied by Baseball Hall leaves Dusty befuddled
Rodón now has allowed five earned runs in back-to-back starts and four or more runs in three of his last five outings. He certainly has a reason to be frustrated, but so does the entire team at this point.
His name has been brought up as a possible trade candidate at the Aug. 2 trade deadline and Tuesday's outing certainly did not boost his stock. If the Giants hang onto Rodón through the deadline, they'll need the sharper -- and cooler-headed -- version of their first-half All-Star if they hope to make a run at one of the wild card spots.