Tagged: all-star game

Time for a Win!!

Alright, we have a problem. Now that all the All-Star stuff is taken care of (Heath’s going…WHOO HOOO!!), we need to focus on the real goal: winning! Which we have not been doing against the Nationals. I think that absolutely stinks.

They are the Nationals. We are the first-place Padres. Do you see the problem here? The first-place Padres should have won the first two games of this series, but they didn’t. No, who won the first two games of the series were the last-place Nationals. Not good at all.

I don’t know what happened, really, but it seems to me like our pitching gave up a bunch of home runs. I think we gave up like four last night. We did hit three of our own, but still.

I don’t like to go into the details of losses like this, so I’m not, other to say that whatever wasn’t going right for the boys these past two days, they’d better get it going tonight. We’ve got a win to get.

We are one game away from getting our 50th win of the season. It’s about time that we get it.

So how are my boys doing, really? I just realized that I haven’t really talked about what’s going on with the players in a long time. I found out today that the Young family is about to have their second child, a boy. I haven’t heard any news from Chris in so long, and this is great news. Congrats to the Youngs!

More good news on Chris’ side. His throwing session yesterday went really well, so maybe, we’ll be able to see Chris out there on the mound sometime before the season ends.

Heath Bell is going to the All-Star game as a replacement for some guy from the Brewers. I am so happy! I’m sorry to say it, but I don’t know if we would have been able to get him there with the vote. We did put in a ton of votes for him and a lot of hard work, and we’ve been rewarded. I’m so happy for Heath! We need someone there to represent our amazing pitching staff, and who better than Heath Bell? I know he’s going to have a great time. Congrats Heath!

Tonight we’ve got Mat Latos going out there. He’d better have a great game! We really, really need to end this first half on a good note. How ’bout a sweep of the Rockies over the weekend? That would be great.

I’d like to point you guys out to a new book that’s coming out soon called, “What the Great Ate: A Curious History of Food and Fame”. It looks like a fascinating book, filled with anecdotes about food and famous people. You can check out some of the interesting stories about a few baseball players on the blog.  

Well, big game against the Nationals tonight. We really really really need to win!!!

GO FIRST-PLACE PADRES!!!

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Absolutely Unacceptable

This is so ridiculous I don’t even know where to start. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, the Padres have only one player representing them in the All-Star game this year, Adrian Gonzalez. This is outrageous!!!

First of all, who has the best record in the National League? That’s the San Diego Padres at 49-33. Who is on the top of the NL West and has been for practically the whole season? That’s right, the San Diego Padres. So why, why why why, is there only ONE San Diego Padre on the All-Star team?

I HATE THE ALL-STAR GAME!!!

Second of all, which pitching staff is like the best in the National League? The San Diego Padres have a group of exemplary pitchers. In my mind, there’s four or five of them who are All-Stars. Sure, they’re young, but they’ve been pitching consistently for a very long time. They’ve proved that they are All-Star worthy. But were they selected for the All-Star game? No, they were not.

I’m very glad that I can’t blame this on the fans, because that would be even more frustrating if we didn’t get them there. We had no say in which pitchers got in, so I can rip into whoever selected them all I want.

I don’t care about the qualifications of the other pitchers that got selected. I don’t care that the manager of the National League is an East coast guy. All I care about here is that we have an abundance of All-Star worthy pitchers here in San Diego and not one of them got picked. Not even HEATH BELL!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is a seriously dis on the city of San Diego and all the hard work that the San Diego Padres have put into this season. This is telling me that what we’ve done this season with the guys we have means nothing. I mean, obviously, the All-Star game is not everything, and it’s not really a measure of a team, but still. With the way we’ve played this season, we deserve to have more players there than we do.

Now, I have never really liked the All-Star game. First, I don’t like it’s placing. Right in the middle of the season is not the best place for it to be. I’ve always hated the fact that our guys have to go and be teammates with all of our rivals (Dodgers, Rockies, etc). I feel like that kind of defeats the point of having opponents in the regular season. I mean, why should you be forced to suddenly be civil with a guy who caused your team to lose just a week ago, or will cause your team to lose just next week? It’s all about that thing where, between the lines, there’s no friendships. There’s no relationships. All there is is baseball and trying to win the game.

I think the All-Star game would be much more appropriate at the end of the season. That way you can look over a player’s performance over an entire season, not just a handful of games. If the All-Star game was at the end of the season, Stephen Strasburg would almost certainly be there. If six games isn’t enough for you, the rest of the season would be.

The All-Star game just bugs me. I know that some people like it, but I really don’t. At all. Not to mention the fact that the American League always dominates.

No doubt, when you think Padres, you think Adrian Gonzalez. And Adrian is very deserving of being there again. But really, Adrian’s not the only player who’s contributed here. We can and have won without him being in the game. We’re fine without him, but we’re just even better than we would have been with him. When he’s in the lineup, we might score a few more runs that we would have without him. But the point is, we can score runs without him. We can win games when he needs a break. This team is really just that: a team. Every player contributes. We aren’t being carried by Adrian. Don’t get me wrong, Adrian definitely deserves this. But what I’m saying is that we have many other players who should be in the All-Star game because they help this team win.

Luke Gregerson, Mat Latos, Heath Bell, you are All-Stars. I don’t care what anyone says. You are All-Stars.

I am so upset about this that I’m going to be boycotting the All-Star game. I wasn’t going to be able to watch it anyways, but I’m still going to boycott it. I’m actually really happy that there’s no way I’ll be able to follow the game. Man.

Whoever’s in charge of the All-Star game, you messed up big time. My boys deserve so much more than this. You have shamed us and our city.

GO FIRST-PLACE PADRES!!!  

Get It Going, Guys!!

There’s just a couple of things I’d like to touch on about the game last night.

First of all, Luke Gregerson. The guy has been absolutely amazing for us this year. Last night he came in to pitch in the top of the 10th and did not do well at all. I know that these guys can’t be perfect all year, so I guess it was okay that he had a bad outing, but it was still tough. He walked two batters in a row, which is unheard of for Luke. It was seriously disturbing to listen to. Luke’s been so amazingly solid this season, it was just shocking to see him do anything different than domination.

He’s only walked six batters all season. It was definitely disappointing that he allowed those three runs in the top of the tenth to lose the game, but it’s okay…as long as we win the next three games in this series.

The other thing was that Scott Hairston got ejected in the bottom of the eighth. As the umpire called him out on strikes, Scotty flipped his bat. When he picked it up, the umpire started having words with him. Scott responded, and the ump threw him out almost instantly. I’m not sure what Scotty said that warranted him getting thrown out, but I was really pleased with him. Good for him to get in the ump’s face and get fired up. I think it’s good for the team to see some fire like that.

The Padres have not been doing that great this week, and that worries me a little. Hopefully we will be able to pick things up for our last couple series until the All-Star break.

Speaking of the All-Star break, look where we are right now. We’re on top of the NL West, and we have been for a really long time. We’ve almost reached the halfway mark of the season. I think we’re going to make it. If we can go a whole first half winning consistently and holding onto our first-place lead, I think we can do it for the second half too.

Can you believe the season is almost half over already? It just amazes me how fast the time’s been going. Incredible.

I know we’ve got a lot of season left. It’s going to be great.

Okay, we’ve got a couple of aces going up against together tonight. Roy Oswalt vs. Mat Latos. I am counting on Mat to have a great outing tonight. We need a solid outing from him, a bunch of offense from the guys, and some great defense. Bottom line, we need to win this game. We’ve got to get back up and get going. We NEED this series!!

GO FIRST-PLACE PADRES!!! 

2009 All-Star Game

First of all, what a great event this year! From the Home Run Derby, to pre-game ceremonies, to the game itself, the All-Star game was a really great event this year. The whole energy coming from St. Louis was amazing.

In the top of the first, Tim Lincecum gave up two runs, but only one earned. Albert Pujols, of all people, had a error!

In the bottom of the second, the NL got three runs, but only two earned. Josh Hamilton made an error.

The game stayed at 3-2 until the fifth, when the AL tied it up at three.

Trevor Hoffman threw the sixth inning. Three years ago, he had given up the winning run to Josh Hamilton. This time, Hamilton grounded into a double play against him. That’s gotta feel good for Trevor. I’m so glad he had a good outing, and I miss him like crazy!!

Adrian came into the game in the top of the seventh. He made a couple plays at first, and in his only at-bat, he walked.

Heath Bell pitched the top of the eighth and gave up the winning run. He allowed a triple, an intentional walk, and a sac-fly.

I feel really bad for Heath, but you know, this game doesn’t really matter. The Padres aren’t going to the World Series.

Did you know that Padres pitchers have lost three out of the last four All-Star games? My goodness. Trevor lost in 2006, Chris Young in 2007, and Heath Bell in 2009. But it’s not suprising, since the Padres are just killed by the American League, anytime, anywhere.

I can’t say that it was entirely Heath’s fault though. I mean, what was Pujols doing making an error in the first? That’s just wrong. The defense behind Heath wasn’t the greatest. And, Heath was working with a catcher that’s he’s probably never worked with, and I’d say that that definitely has something to do with it. He threw well, and I’m very pleased with our All-Star.

I watched a bunch of his interviews over the past few days, and he’s just sooo funny!! The guy had a ton of fun during this whole event, and he’s never going to forget this.

Adrian, I think, was very tired through this whole thing. They had a rough trip to get to St. Louis, and come on, Adrian’s played in every single game for the Padres this season. The guy’s gotta be very tired. I hope he can get back to San Diego soon and take a nice, long nap today. Poor guy.

So overall, it was a great event, even though the AL came out on top again. Man, this is turning into a big joke!! The American League is superior. I think that was proved a loooong time ago. The AL is like 12-0-1 in the last 13 All-Star games!!

The Padres will be playing four games against the Rockies starting tomorrow night. And we’re going to be at home!! The team hasn’t been at home since…well, it was only a week and a half ago, but it feels so much longer!! It’s going to be amazing to be home, and I’m going to be there on Saturday!!

GO PADRES!!!

2008 All-Star Game

In an event revolving around MLB’s biggest and best hitters, you would think the All-Star game would be a slugfest. That’s the Home Run Derby. But not the All-Star game. No, this year’s Midsummer Classic was a pitcher’s duel. Oh, sure, the offense did help out a little, but the story of this game was the pitching. In a crazy game that lasted 15 innings, 11 NL pitchers gave up 4 runs and 12 AL pitchers gave up 3 runs. Remember, these are starters and closers-no long-relief or setup guys. Matt Holliday went deep in the 5th to give the NL its first lead. The NL added another run, but J.D Drew of the Red Sox tied it with a two-run homer. Our boy Adrian Gonzalez sac-flied to make it 3-2 NL. The AL tied it, so we went on and on and on to the 15th. The AL finally won it early Wednesday morning, 4-3. This game really reminded me of the way the Padres have been playing. Leaving runners in scoring position with less than two outs ( 28 total left on), unable to catch base-stealers (2 out of 9 caught total), fighting back but not hard enough, and extra innings. I can totally see Adrian walking in the dugout in the 13th: “Come on guys, this is nothing! We aren’t even to the 22nd yet!” In fact, after the game, Adrian said, “It was like a Padre game.” Adrian entered in the 6th and stayed the rest of the way. The defense was pretty good. Dan Uggla made 3 errors, though. But Adrian made an amazing play that saved the game for the moment. A huge part of this game was base stealing. It was like CY was pitching. Russell Martin was very busy trying to throw out baserunners. But like I said, the story of this game is the pitching. The NL got out of so many jams! Tons of runners in scoring position and only 4 scored. It was amazing. The pitching and the defense, working together, were able to work their way out of some major problems. But like the Padres, the NL finally gave up the lead in the 15th. It was a wonderful but disappointing game.