The San Diego Padres fell behind early, trailing 8-2 after two innings, before tying the Colorado Rockies in the 7th inning on Friday night. Unfortunately, rookie Third Basemen Nelson Arenado was able to break that tie with a solo HR in the bottom of the 9th inning to give the Rockies the 10-9 victory, their 32nd win of the season.
Fans of the Padres have come to known two different sides of Edinson Volquez. There’s “good Volquez” who has filthy stuff and a bulldog demeanor, and there’s “bad Volquez” who can’t throw strikes or get anybody out. On Friday night, “bad Volquez” got the start in Denver and gave up 9 runs in 2.1 innings. Anywhere else that would’ve been too big of a hole to dig out of, but at Coors Field no lead is insurmountable.
Tyson Ross, Tommy Layne and Brad Boxberger were able to pitch 5.2 scoreless innings in relief of Volquez before Joe Thatcher gave up the game-winning HR to Arenado before recording an out.
Every Padres hitter that got a hit got at least 2 of them. Everth Cabrera, Carlos Quentin, Jedd Gyorko, Kyle Blanks, Cameron Maybin and Yasmani Grandal had good games with the lumber. Meanwhile, the rest of the team went hitless, including Chris Denorfia and Chase Headley.
This was another game that showed the wasted potential of the young position players on the Padres roster. This team can hit and score with any other MLB team, and that’s the first time San Diego could say that about their team in a long time. Unfortunately, until the starting pitching gets more consistent they’re going to find it very hard to string together wins.