So the Padres took another series, this one against the Reds. I didn’t catch the first few innings, but I understand that the visitors squandered numerous opportunities against a less-than-stellar Jake Peavy.

By the time I got home to watch the game, the Padres were in the process of tying it up in the fourth. Oh, and that baserunning I complained about in the seventh inning of Wednesday night’s game? All is forgiven. Brian Giles drawing a walk, going first to third on a grounder to the pitcher, and scoring on a Ramon Hernandez ground ball to short was a thing of beauty. Unless you’re a Reds fan, of course, in which case it’s disgusting.

Ryan Klesko coming around from second on a grounder to D’Angelo Jimenez with the bases loaded was pretty sweet, too. Speaking of Jimenez, what’s happened to that guy? He was okay with the Padres; nothing special, but okay. He looked absolutely terrible this series. First pitch outs, boneheaded plays in the field. Trying to nail Sean Burroughs at third on a routine grounder and not flipping the ball to Barry Larkin on the Hernandez ball basically cost the Reds four runs in the fifth. Anyone can have a bad night, but you really don’t expect to see those kinds of plays at the big-league level.

Peavy eventually got into a groove and that, as they say, was that. Jay Witasick and Brandon Puffer worked the final three innings without incident, which means the key relievers are fresh for the Cubbies.

Other random notes:

• Kerry Robinson’s at-bat against Ryan Wagner in the seventh was hilarious, but only because the game was well in hand by that point. Haven’t seen a guy swing at and miss a pitch by that much in a long time.
• Need another reason to like Khalil Greene? He drew two walks last night (okay, one of them was intentional, but still) and is now up to 12 this year. Check this out:

              PA* BB BB/PA*
  2003, AA   245  16  .065
  2003, AAA  339  20  .059
  2003, NL    69   4  .058
  2004, NL   127  12  .094
  

  * For our purposes, PA is AB + BB.

  It’s early yet, but this is exactly the kind of improvement you want to see in a young hitter.

• Hernandez had a nice at-bat in the fourth, driving an RBI double to deep right center. Hopefully he can get out of his season-long funk before too long. His OPS (634) is still below Gary Bennett’s (707), which is more than a little disturbing.

Other Stuff

• Breaking the mold (Sports Illustrated). Mostly good article by John Donovan about Sean Burroughs in the leadoff slot. A few items need fixing: "the bullpen besides Hoffman is questionable" should also mention Aki Otsuka and Scott Linebrink; "he doesn’t hit for much power" would be better as "he hasn’t hit for much power this season"; and if Donovan is going to talk about Burroughs’ "lack of speed", it might be useful to invoke the names of Wade Boggs and Brian Downing, who regularly batted at the top for the Red Sox and Angels, respectively, 20 years ago. Both men, I’m fairly confident, had less speed than Burroughs (who runs a lot better than people who haven’t actually seen him play might expect). But I’m nitpicking here. The props are appreciated. [via Citizens Blog for the Philadelphia Phillies]
• 45 Jokes from The Laughter Lover Need a new joke? Why not try a really old one? [thanks to LanguageHat]

Gotta run. Cubs are in town for three. Greg Maddux, Sergio Mitre, and Glendon Rusch sure looks a lot more promising than, say, Mark Prior, Kerry Wood, and Carlos Zambrano. Jeff and I will be out on the highways of California as part of our Cal League Experience. Rancho Cucamonga and Adelanto (aka High Desert) this weekend. Full report early next week. Meantime, let’s take care of business against the boys from Chicago.