Lots going on. Not the best of times for a couple of former Padres, Davey Lopes and Randy Smith. Lopes was fired yesterday as manager of the Brewers, Smith last week as GM of the Tigers. Lopes should hook on with someone; he seems like a pretty bright guy. Not sure about Smith. He sure did some good things here in San Diego, but he took a lot of abuse for the moves he made in Detroit. I haven’t studied his record enough to judge one way or the other.

In the Padres’ loss to the Dodgers last night, Bruce Bochy had his club play the final few innings with Bubba Trammell in left, Ron Gant in center, and Ryan Klesko in right. Is that a frightening defensive alignment or what? The punch line is that Gant made a spectacular diving catch to end the eighth inning and save a couple of runs.

Matt DeWitt, recently recalled to fill the spot previously occupied by Juan Moreno, made his Pads debut. Moreno didn’t get much of a chance, but honestly, he looked pretty bad every time he pitched. His fastball was down around 86-87 MPH and his command was terrible. Moreno did snap off a few nasty breaking pitches, but for the most part he made Mitch Williams look like John Candelaria. If you don’t know who those guys were, ask your dad; I’m too tired to come up with contemporary pitchers. Oh, I don’t know. He made John Rocker look like David Wells.

Kevin Jarvis hurt his elbow in Wednesday night’s game against the Giants. He’s expected to miss at least one start, possibly more. Rick Sutcliffe suggested tonight that Ben Howard might get the call. And why not? He’s had three outstanding starts at Double-A Mobile so far. Don’t tell anyone, but Howard might actually be better than the more highly touted Dennis Tankersley.

Plenty else to talk about, but that will have to wait another day.