The boys of summer stepped into the spring sunshine and brought home a W for the Friar Faithful.
Small things count. Details matter. The 2023 Padres were not very good at doing the small things like moving runners up or working deep counts, and it kept them out of the playoffs last year.
All throughout spring training, though, new manager Mike Shildt said the 2024 Padres were going to be better with the little stuff.
Darnit if he wasn't right.
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The Padres came from behind twice to beat the Giants 6-4 on Opening Day at Petco Park, and they did it with small ball. The Friars had nine hits and eight of them were singles. In fact, San Diego has scored 21 runs in their last two games and only hit one homer.
"It's really about trying to beat the other team in every way possible," says manager Mike Shildt. "Sometimes you use the bomb and sometimes you use other means to cut and slice. Whatever the game presents, that's how we're going to play the game. I thought the guys were fantastic today, taking what the game gave them, playing the game the right way, taking good at-bats based on the situation. I thought it was fantastic."
Oh, and their pitching staff is pretty good, too.
Yu Darvish got the start and had all his good strikeout stuff working. He punched out four of the first six hitters he faced before running into trouble in the thrd inning. Michael Conforto led off with a double and scored when Nick Ahmed snuck a double down the third-base line to put the Giants up 1-0. That was the only run Darvish allowed in 5.0 innings of work.
San Francisco started a guy who's going to be in the Cy Young conversation. Logan Webb retired the first nine Padres in order but finally got into trouble when he walked Manny Machado to lead off the fifth inning. Ha-Seong Kim and Jurickson Profar followed with singles to bring home Manny and tie it 1-1. Another single from Luis Campusano loaded the bases, then Tyler Wade hit a dribbler up the first-base line to bring home Kim and put the Padres on top 2-1.
The Giants took the lead back with a pair of runs off Johny Brito in the top of the seventh inning, making it 3-2. Then manager Bob Melvin went to his bullpen and things went sideways for San Francisco.
Luke Jackson gave up singles to Campusano and Wade, then we saw some more of those little things. Wade took off for second base. Giants catcher Patrick Bailey's throw was low and got away from Ahmed at second base, allowing Campusano to score the tying run and touch off a rally. Rookie Jackson Merrill worked a walk to chase Jackson and bring on Ryan Walker, who was not much better. Xander Bogaerts singled to left field to score Wade and put the Friars on top 4-3.
Not many of those singles was hit especially hard. While home runs are nice, sometimes it's the one-base hits that annoy pitchers even more.
"I'd imagine, man, especially when you get some bloops? I feel like those are the ones that really, they turn around and be like, it will really piss them off," says Bogaerts. "Homers? I mean, they hang a pitch it's supposed to happen. But I feel like the tough pitches that, I would imagine, hurts them more."
Of course, line drives are not frowned upon. A couple of batters later, Jake Cronenworth put it to bed. Jake continued the hot start he had in Korea with a line drive double down the right field line. Merrill and Bogaerts scored to make it 6-3 and the Friars bullpen took it from there. Yuki Matsui was flawless over 1.2 innings, and Robert Suarez, though he gave up a solo homer to Conforto, got his second save of the year.
Profar had what might be the best assessment of this game, and perhaps this season, we're going to find.
"We have a complete ballclub. We can do a lot of things and that's what makes it fun," says Profar. "We have everything. We have power, we have speed, we have really good pitching, we have we have really good defense. It's a fun ballclub."
If they keep putting up games like this it's certainly going to be a fun ballclub to watch. The Padres improve to 2-1 on the season and get to throw Joe Musgrove in Game 2 against the Giants on Friday night at Petco Park.
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