SD 6, WSH 5: Friars ride Ross' great start to victory

The climb to .500 continues. With the Dodgers beating the Reds again tonight, the battle for the division is starting to elude our grasp, but that doesn't stop the Friars from getting in some action against the Nationals tonight. After a shaky and annoying bullpen experience, with not enough offense to back it, the Padres pulled things together to split the 3-game series. Tyson Ross did his thing, showing why his slider is one of the best in the game, but they seriously couldn't match him up against his brother? That would have been way cooler.

What was still very cool, was that the older Ross put in a good 6 innings giving up only 6 hits and 2 runs. Four earned, if you're counting the sloppy relief effort from Shawn Kelley and Marc Rzepczynski. What's even cooler is that big bro struck out nine.

It's tough to fake that out, Harper. Though you might have had an even better argument for your toe with that nasty slider.

The lineup backed up their boy by going double-digits with the hits today. Matt Kemp was on it in the top of the third, starting the scoring off with an RBI-double, which is his 24th double of the season. Justin Upton followed up with what he does best: smashing a home run that left the park faster than the time it took for Gio Gonzalez to turn around and watch it leave the park. After Yangervis Solarte tacked on another run with a sac fly in the 4th, Upton returned in the 7th to just hit another home run. No big deal.

Hey, even Tyson got himself two hits today. One resulted in him getting doubled up, but the other had him scoring on Kemp's double. Him getting on base had his little brother smirking up a storm too.

Ross went 2-2 today along with his stellar start. Little Joe is going to have a lot to work against in his start tomorrow.

Despite the receding lead, the Pads held on tightly enough to earn their 62nd win of the season, thanks to a Joaquin Benoit 8th and a Craig Kimbrel 9th. Tomorrow they go for the series win with Andrew Cashner getting the shot to beat up Ross' little brother on the mound. It should be a fun game to watch, so catch that at 4:05 PST.