first pitch: 6:40 p.m., PT
television: Channel 4
matchup: Adam Eaton (6-1, 3.35 ERA) vs Russ Ortiz (4-2, 5.11 ERA)
preview: Padres.com
Padres finally lost a series in May, dropping two of three to the Mariners in Seattle. The offense sputtered badly in the last two games and looks to get back on track in the desert.
AB BA OBP SLG
Eaton vs current Diamondbacks 159 .283 .363 .465
Ortiz vs current Padres 206 .248 .342 .359
Big damage from Luis Gonzalez (.370/.469/.815 in 27 AB), Royce Clayton (.455/.600/.636 in 11 AB), and Alex Cintron (.353/.421/.647 in 17 AB). Eaton has pretty well neutralized Shawn Green (.205/.250/.341 in 44 AB) over the years. Overall, opponents are hitting .259/.316/.448 (think Matt LeCroy) against Eaton on the season, but just .228/.286/.281 with RISP (weaker version of Rey Ordonez).
On the other side, Ortiz is struggling with Arizona in the early going but getting some wins despite poor numbers. He’s averaging fewer than six innings per start, striking out just 3.83 batters per 9 innings, and allowing the opposition to hit .305/.386/.465 against him. Lefties have put up alarming numbers (.374/.442/.551). Padres having the most success against Ortiz are Brian Giles (.429/.636/.500 in 14 AB) and Sean Burroughs (.455/.500/.545 in 11 AB). Dave Roberts (.143/.217/.143 in 21 AB) hasn’t done much, so maybe they’ll unleash their secret weapon, Xavier Nady. Then again, maybe not.
WTF. Gonzalez is the tying run.
I like the fact that Bochy is pulling Aki. Breaking his formula.
Ditto on Counsell, but I am already on record of thinking poorly of him
Oh my, Glaus crushed that one. Fortunately he got under it.
That’s what you get for posing Glaus! Nothing.
God bless you Chris Hammond
Good call, Eric. It’s nice to have so many options available in the late innings. Hammond is a stud.
Our pen rules
I thought for sure that Hammond was coming in earlier to relieve Eaton instead of Seanez. But he came up big again when needed.
Hi, guys. Just got in and caught up on the messages.
We do not want Danny Graves. Someone mentioned he saved a lot of games last season, but he was ugly doing it. He saved 41, blew nine, was 1-6 with a 3.95 ERA. He’s terrible. The other thing, if the Padres did want him, he’s available for nothing a few days. No one will trade for him.
One other thing: Bruce, there is a delay on MLBtv. I have it, and I think it’s about 15-30 seconds.
That’s what I figured, but I had an even longer one tonight after having buffering problem. For some reason I was having trouble playing it in Real Player tonight trying to get a bigger picture.
I was going to post a gratuitous Blum-bashing comment, but even he is getting in on the act! Nice going Blum, you just earned yourself another guaranteed week of starts!
I saw no one was talking about Loretta tonight. Buster Olney said in his blog that if he is out for an extended period, then the Padres may look to acquire Polanco from the Phillies.
It’s a save situation now. Here comes Bochy.
Someone over on the fanstop board said that KT was on 1090 saying that EY was going to be back in a month and that DJ/Blum was going to hold the line until then. Don’t know if that is just posturing, but I am not sure that even if EY comes back then, that he will be much of a hitter after his shoulder injury. If they can get Polanco for cheap, I say do it, he can then play third later in the year if Burroughs continues to suck it up at the plate.
That’s twice in a week that Reyes has failed to close out a ballgame in the ninth with a sizable lead, only to have Hoffy come in for an out (presumably).
If you don’t have the Insider thing on ESPN.com, I basically put Olney’s entire comment on Padres Nation.
I guess Reyes is a setup man in that way. He makes it a save situation.
Someone test Counsell for the juice, or something, but I want some of that.
Death, taxes, Hoffman. Game over. A one-pitch save.
That’s the best kind of save you can get. It can’t come any cheaper
I guess he could have picked one of the runners off. But I’ll take what we got.
Now that would be a rarity, and boy would that runner feel like a goat too!
Trevor has outdone himself with the pitch-per-save efficiency. He must have tied a record tonight.
Oh, and we forget. The Padre are in first again!
First place is nice. Let’s see if May can pull another rabbit out of his hat. A betting man would probably vote against that happening. But it would be nice to take the first two and then enjoy Peavy on Thursday.
That was a little more interesting than it needed to be but we’ll take it. As you say, Bruce, first place is nice.
Just got home. Ugly win. Still a win. Nice to see Nevin have a good night at the plate.
A win is a win, but glad to see people as frustrated about the Meche loss as I was. I messed up my Tivo so only caught the game in the bottom of the 7th inning. But it sounds like Ortiz was wild (6 BB) but we kept hacking. The Meche game was the same way; that guy did not have an out pitch, so going deep in the count was not that risky, yet guys were up there hacking. That allowed them to get to their good bullpen and not their bad bullpen.
But a win is a win. Glad to see Nevin get a few hits; even so, I would love to see Nady get in there somehow. Maybe as a base coach, or a bullpen warm up catcher?
A couple tough match ups coming up. May vs. anyone is tough; then Webb vs. Peavy. Webb is very tough, so both games ought to be a challenge. But nice to take game 1, in their house.