LOS ANGELES — Before the Giants started their four-game series here against the Dodgers, Gabe Kapler wanted to make a point. A reporter had asked about the value of getting Kyle Harrison exposed to the unfriendly setting of Dodger Stadium, a venue where the 22-year-old left-hander is sure to pitch in meaningful games.

Thursday night was not that. San Francisco’s slide over the first six games of this road trip means it will take a minor miracle to make the postseason. A few hours later, the Giants (76-77) fell below .500 for the first time since June 4 with a 7-2 loss. Their elimination number dropped to seven.

But, before first pitch, Kapler said, “Yeah, so, I just want to say this because I can kind of sense where some of these conversations are going, which is things like evaluation of young players, experience for a guy like Kyle Harrison. To me, I think we all need to be thinking that we are still in a playoff race.”

Realistically, though, the Giants are at a point in the season where it’s time to look to 2024. A team that believes it has a chance doesn’t go hitless for five innings against a rookie, nor does its right fielder forget how many outs there are, allowing the go-ahead run to score on a sac fly, nor does one of its leverage relievers bury two pitches to the backstop, leading to two more runs. To top it off, they committed two more errors, bringing their MLB-leading total to 112, and struck out 15 times.

“I think it’s just an attitude thing where we should take a little more pride in our work and gotta look the in the mirror, myself first more than anybody,” said Mike Yastrzemski, who made the uncharacteristic mistake in right field that allowed Los Angeles to open a 3-2 advantage. “It’s just one of those things where I think we deserve to be embarrassed like we are right now. You just have to wear that for the next 10 hours until we get to play again.”

The loss was the Giants’ 26th in their past 31 road games, their worst road stretch in a single season since 1902.

“Not crisp enough across the board, obviously,” Kapler said afterward. “It’s just not good enough to win baseball games against good teams. It’s not good enough to win baseball games, as we’ve seen now for quite some time, consistently, at all. We’ve gotta get better, or we’re gonna continue to get beat by teams like the Dodgers.”

If there was any good news Thursday night, it was that the Giants’ silver linings came from their young core.

The Giants lined up Blake Sabol behind the plate; Harrison on the mound; Marco Luciano at shortstop; and Tyler Fitzgerald in center, making his major-league debut. The only up-the-middle position that didn’t feature a rookie still had an eye toward the future, with Thairo Estrada at second base and proven to be a core piece for 2024 and beyond.

Take Harrison, for example.

Against a dangerous Dodgers lineup, Harrison allowed two runs on three hits over 5⅓ innings, the third time in six major-league starts he has recorded an out in the sixth inning. Although his line featured only two strikeouts, consider it a gutty effort given that Harrison was a “50-50” proposition to start hours before game time, Kapler said, sick with an illness that also covered his body in hives and a rash.

If the concerns that led to Harrison being optioned after his last start were his progressively declining fastball velocity, his predictable pitch mix and left-handed hitters’ inexplicable success against him, he did a good job of quashing those worries Thursday night, with seven days of rest since his last start. Harrison threw a bullpen session Monday in Arizona that he said unlocked some things for him.

“I wouldn’t say it was necessarily the toughest grind, but I definitely grinded through some little things,” Harrison said. “That was good for me to just go down to AZ, throw a ‘pen, find my (arm) slot again, and get back to doing what I do best, shooting fastball’s up in the zone, so I was happy with that.”

He generated only three whiffs on 20 swings against his fastball but averaged 93.3 mph with the pitch, not quite his typical 94-95, but the most oomph he’s had since his third major-league start. They also made up a smaller percentage of his pitches than any previous start, throwing more sliders and changeups.

One pitch he’d like to have back was a 93 mph heater he grooved to J.D. Martinez with two strikes, which Martinez deposited into the right field bleachers.

Harrison’s 75th and final pitch was a slider that forced Freddie Freeman to roll over on an easy grounder to second base. It was Harrison’s seventh at-bat against a lefty, and all seven ended in outs. Through his first five starts, lefties had been 12-for-24 against Harrison.

“I thought he pitched really well,” Kapler said. “He wasn’t throwing hard, necessarily, but he had enough carry to beat some of those guys. And those are some of the better hitters in baseball. … He was able to make some pitches with his changeup, made a couple with his breaking ball, as well. I thought he stayed in his delivery, he worked quickly, controlled the pace of the game, and was throwing enough strikes to keep us in that game all the way through.”

The three rookies occupying the bottom third of the Giants’ batting order combined to reach base five times, including back-to-back-to-back walks to force in their first run in the fifth without the benefit of a hit. Fitzgerald also roped a double down the left field line in the seventh for his first major-league hit, getting a chance to show off his elite sprint speed for the first time.

Fitzgerald threw his bat emphatically into the ground after taking ball four on the eighth pitch of his at-bat in the fifth inning, forcing in Mike Yastrzemski, who got the hitless rally started with two outs when he was hit by Sheehan. Backed into an 0-2 count, Fitzgerald worked a bases-loaded walk, which followed a nine-pitch battle won by Sabol and, before that, a six-pitch free pass to Luciano. All three times, the rookies worked their way back from two-strike counts to reach base.

“(Those) are all major-league at-bats,” Kapler said. “Fitzgerald looked like a major-league center fielder out there. He looked comfortable and competitive in the batter’s box. Luciano hit one of our harder balls of the night (a 106.9 mph line drive single to right field, second only to Pederson’s 108.6 mph home run). I thought he was in control of his at-bats all the way through. He looked confident and looked competitive as well.”

Their only other run, though, came on a no-doubt solo shot from Joc Pederson in the sixth inning, his 15th of the season, measured at 430 feet, which also registered their first hit of the night. Emmet Sheehan, who no-hit the Giants for six innings in his MLB debut in June, didn’t allow a hit for all of his 4⅔ innings Thursday, either, and struck out nine, including seven of the first nine hitters he faced. In Sheehan’s 10 other appearances, he has a 6.18 ERA.

The score was tied 2-2 in the sixth when catcher Will Smith tagged and scored from third base on a relatively shallow pop fly to right field. He had a head start because Yastrzemski took a few steps toward the dugout before realizing it wasn’t the third out. His throw home was offline and late. Smith, not a fast runner, made it to third on a triple when Fitzgerald laid out for a ball in the right-center field gap, it kicked off his glove and away from Yastrzemski, who was backing up the play.

Kapler said “Yaz obviously knows that can’t happen; nobody’s gonna feel worse about it than he will,” and the veteran outfielder took accountability afterward.

“It was a weird play (before), but there’s no excuse to not know the outs,” Yastrzemski said. “I got lost, wasn’t thinking and just completely thought there were two outs. … When you cost your team like that, it’s never a good feeling. Kind of an inexcusable, bad mistake that just can’t happen.”

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In the eighth, the Dodgers placed runners at second and third against Luke Jackson and tacked on two insurance runs without getting another hit.

With Kike Hernández batting, after J.D. Davis bobbled a grounder from Chris Taylor and James Outman doubled to right field, Jackson threw two sliders in the dirt, three pitches apart, that allowed both runners to score, despite Hernández eventually striking out. Davis’ error was their second of the game and 112th of the season, 12 more than any other team.

“There’s so many guys in here that work so hard, and to continuously be snake-bit by little, stupid mistakes that could be avoidable that we need to just hold each other to a higher standard,” Yastrzemski said. “It kind of sucks. … I don’t really have an answer right now. It’s probably just going to be a reflecting point at some point during the offseason. Maybe we’ll talk about it at some point because it’s not like you can just look at someone and say, hey, don’t make a mistake. That’s not how people work. I think there’s a way we can play with a little more edge in every game.”