Kiddie Day At The Ballpark

September 17, 2009

With mainstay players like Adrian Gonzalez, Kevin Kouzmanoff, David Eckstein, and Will Venable NOT in the starting lineup on Wednesday, it looked like kid’s day at the ballpark. Six out of the nine pitchers used by the Padres were under 25 years old. And the guy who’s the buzz of San Diego today made his major league debut at only 22 years old.

Edward Mujica made only his second major league start. He went 4.2 innings, allowing two runs on six hits with no walks and five strikeouts. He was good, but boy we used a lot of pitchers yesterday!

After Mujica, it went Webb, Poreda, Gallagher, Russell, Thacher, Perdomo, Ramos, and finally, Bell.

In the bottom of the third, Chase Headley grounded out, driving in Everth for our first run.

But the Diamondbacks, who seem to be a lot better than what the numbers say, got two runs in the fifth, and one run in the sixth.

In the bottom of the sixth, Henry Blanco walked and Drew Macias was hit-by-pitch. Luis Durango, in his second at-bat ever, hit a bunt single to load the bases. That was his second bunt single of the game. Nick Hundley singled to drive in a run, and Tony Gwynn sac-flied another one in. The game was then tied at three. 

In the top of the seventh, Arizona got two runs to take the lead, 5-3. Things were not looking good for our boys. They went into the bottom of the ninth, down by two runs. Tony Gwynn walked to start off the inning. Two outs later, Adrian came into the game to pinch-hit for his brother, Edgar. And guess what he does? He hits a game-tying two run homer to the left field corner. It was soooo great!!

Heath Bell came into the top of the 10, and what do you know, his new shave actually worked! He got two quick outs before walking a batter. Thankfully, that batter was caught stealing and Heath made it through the inning. That’s gotta feel so good for Heath. After those three nasty outings, it must have been amazing to get through one unscathed.

 In the bottom of the 10th, Luis Durango led off the inning. He singled yet again, putting the potential winning run on base, with a ton of speed! 

David Eckstein then flew out. Everth Cabrera came up next. While he was batter, Durango stole second. Everth singled to right, the first baseman and the second baseman diving and missing the ball. Durango, with his incredible speed, ran all the home and avoided the catcher’s tag, scoring the winning run.

 It was so great!! An amazing effort by my boys to come back and win this game.

And talk about Luis Durango. This guy just got called up on Monday, made his major league debut yesterday. In his first two at-bats he had infield singles. He also had a sac-bunt and a single. He stole a base, and ran around like crazy. The Padres have not had a guy with this kind of speed for a very long time. I mean, if you thought Everth was fast, just wait until you see this guy. Whew! This guy is very, very exciting, and the talk of San Diego today. The Union Tribune raved about him this morning.

What a great game. I was so thankful that we avoided the sweep and were able to see some new talent out there.

We have an off-day today before heading out to Pittsburgh for the weekend. We will play the Pirates for four games. Then they’ll head to Colorado and Arizona before coming home for the end of the season. Oh my, it’s coming up fast!

On a side note, Jacob Edward Peavy is going to be making his first start with the White Sox on Saturday. I’m very sad that he’s not with us anymore, but it will be good for him to be on the mound again. He says he won’t be 100%, but I hope he does extremely well. I MISS YOU LIKE CRAZY JAKE!!!

GO PADRES!! GO JAKE!!!    

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Written by Kaity Bergquist Posted in Dailies Tagged with adrian gonzalez, diamondbacks, everth cabrera, heath bell, luis durango, padres, san diego