Padres Game Recap – Sep. 4, 2015

Petco park turned into Coors West tonight as 8 home runs were launched into the seats between the Pads and the Dodgers to tie a stadium record.  Unfortunately 5 of them were off the bats of Dodgers hitters and they beat the Pads 8-4 to tie the series at one each.

Shields just didn’t have it tonight.  We’ve seen nights like that for him before where he really didn’t have much to work with but somehow found a way to get through the 5th with the game still intact.  It was just barely one of those efforts tonight as he allowed 2 home runs and walked 6 yet only permitted 3 runs to cross.  An ugly outing in every sense of the word, but not disastrous to him nor the team.

While Shields was doing his best Houdini impersonation, the offense was playing some long ball of its own.  Kemp blasted a 2-run shot in the first, and Gyorko reached the left field seats with a solo shot in the 3rd to keep the boys in the game with a tie through the 5th.

The wheels fell off in the 6th, however, as the bullpen for the second night in a row allowed things to get out of hand.  Mateo started the inning fine with a strike out but then issued a walk prompting Murphy to go to Rzepczynski.  After a rough outing last night lasting to a season high 6 batters and 20 pitches, he didn’t fare much better tonight as the first batter he faced took him deep to put L.A. on top 5-3.  He allowed a single to the next batter then two hitters later gave up another long ball this time to Gonzalez to put the Pads down 7-3.  Edwards was then called upon to make his Padres debut and the first hitter he faced also went yard to spoil his unveiling. 8-3 Dodgers…good night.

The only sign of protest the padres could muster was a pinch hit home run by guess who…yep, Brett Wallace.  He hammered his 3rd long ball of the season coming off the bench deep into the right field seats to make it 8-4, and that was the final.

One other interesting moment came in the 5th when there was a strange umpiring decision.  Utley was on first and a ground ball was hit to Myers at first.  Wil threw to Gyorko covering second to start the double play, but Jedd was off the bag when he caught the throw.  Simultaneously Utley slid in and took Gyorko out but was nowhere near the base.  Utley was called out but no interference appeared to be called on turning the double play, which would have meant the batter would have been automatically called out as well.  So, not sure if they ruled Jedd was “in the neighborhood” and Utley was within reach of the bag (both wrong IMO), or whether they ruled Jedd nowhere near the base and thus the take out slide was only on Jedd trying to complete an out at first thus not technically a double play, thus causing only Utley and not the batter to be automatically out.  Hope to get some clarification tomorrow.

Ross goes to the hill for the Friars tomorrow with first pitch crossing the plate at 5:40.  Look forward to bringing the call to you tomorrow along with Uncle teddy on the Mighty 1090.

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