Giants center fielder Angel Pagan is not in Wednesday’s Giants lineup, making it the 10th game Crazy Horse will miss since injuring his hamstring two Saturdays ago. Before the injury Pagan had started 45 of 49 games, all in center field. In his absence, Gregor Blanco has slid over from left field and Andres Torres has been the new regular starter.

The Giants haven’t missed Pagan’s production from the starting lineup because Torres has been fantastic. His two-run homer in Tuesday’s game was the only offense the Giants could muster against Toronto’s Josh Johnson. Since Pagan went down, Torres has a .371 OBP and improved to a .323 mark for the season.

The real loss has been the thinning of the bench, leaving Bruce Bochy with just three reserve bats to use as pinch-hitters and defensive replacements. With the now-startling decision not to put Pagan on the disabled list, the backup outfielder has become Brett Pill. Though he has logged only two innings in left this year, that’s two too many for my liking. Francisco Peguero would have been a nice option to have on the roster, at least for his defense.

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Pablo Sandoval played just seven innings yesterday after returning from a foot injury that cost him three games. Bruce Bochy said after the game that this had been the plan all along, trying to ease the big fella back into action. Joaquin Arias finished the game after Panda notched an 0-3 at the plate, seeing just six pitches. Never change, Pablo.

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The Giants have won the last 14 times Barry Zito has taken the mound at AT&T. While Zito hasn’t sparkled in every one of those games, he hasn’t allowed more than four runs at home since allowing seven to the New York Mets in early August of last year. Through seven starts this season, Zito’s home ERA is 1.00. That’s one. Uno. Un. Eins.

Here’s the lineup for Wednesday against RHP R.A. Dickey (5-7, 5.18 ERA):

CF Blanco

2B Scutaro

3B Sandoval

C Posey

RF Pence

1B Belt

LF Torres

SS Crawford

LHP Zito (4-3, 3.88 ERA)

Angel Pagan will miss today’s series finale against the A’s and tomorrow’s game in St. Louis after getting a cortisone shot, according to Amy G of CSN Bay Area. The center fielder has been out since Sunday with a sore hamstring, with Gregor Blanco shifting to center and Andres Torres filling in at left field.

If the lineup looks different today, I expect it is due to the three straight losses suffered to the Oakland A’s. Bochy’s comments after last night’s debacle made it seem like wholesale changes were in order. Crawford is batting second, a spot that had been occupied by Marco Scutaro in almost every game this season. Scutaro has been replaced by Nick Noonan, but that has been attributed to an illness rather than poor play. Scutaro allowed the A’s to score a run with an error in Wednesday’s game.

Bochy is all but certain that Chad Gaudin will get the start on Sunday in St. Louis. After the injury to Ryan Vogelsong, the Giants skipped his spot in the rotation followed by a spot start from rookie left-hander Mike Kickham. But with Kickham’s underwhelming debut and no other viable options, the Giants will stretch out their long man for Sunday. Gaudin last pitched Tuesday, where he threw 54 pitches and gave up one run across three innings. Bochy set that up perfectly, pat on the back for the old manager.

After Sunday, the Giants can skip that spot in the rotation twice, not needing anyone until June 15th thanks to some well-placed days off.

Here’s the lineup against RHP A.J. Griffin (5-3, 3.84 ERA):

CF Blanco

SS Crawford

3B Sandoval

C Posey

RF Pence

1B Belt

LF Torres

2B Noonan

LHP Zito (3-3, 4.13 ERA)

Looking at this outing as a spot start from a non-prospect might help this hurt a little less. But the truth is Kickham is the consensus No. 3 pitcher in the Giants farm system and, at 24, is eight months older than Madison Bumgarner. On the scatterplot of outcomes I had drawn up for this game, this one falls under “AW FRICK C’MON JEEZ”.

Kickham looked steady early, slowly unleashing an arsenal of breaking pitches to back up his 91-94 MPH fastball. Two straight sliders made Chris Young looks silly and a third did the same to Nate Freiman. His curveball and changeup were let go in the third inning, with both pitches getting swinging strikes.

Now on to the bad. After a challenge fastball to Derek Norris was sent into the left-field bleachers, Kickham earned himself a big-league ERA. He was behind in the count 3-1, and Norris easily caught up to 91 over the plate. Then things fell apart in the third inning when his command abandoned him, with Kickham issuing a walk to Chris Young. A Cespedes double and an intentional walk later, Kickham had his opportunities against Jed Lowrie with the bases loaded. But a 3-2 walk on a close pitch sealed the fate for the young lefty.

A Nate Freiman single would end Kickham’s night, with Bruce Bochy removing the starter with this line:

2.1 IP, 4 H, 4 ER, 4 BB, 3K

As was mentioned earlier, Kickham is a lock to get at least one more start. The Giants have several off-days in early June and could make do with a four-man rotation, but a lot of that will come down to all five starters’ performance over the next week. If the bullpen can get rested by June 3rd, I don’t see any reason to push Kickham any further.