Padres squeeze in another Opening Day victory

If we can't have our own Opening Day win, we'll spoil it for everybody else. That's what the Padres did in our second road series of the away trip before we head back to Petco.

All lined up and ready to go! ⚾️ pic.twitter.com/4KiKSmvbmh

— San Diego Padres (@Padres) April 11, 2016

To continue the path to redemption, Andrew Cashner took the mound against young'un Aaron Nola, and redeem he did. With 92 pitches (63 of them strikes) it almost looked more like vengeance than redemption.

Cash went a good 5 innings and was throwing pure gas the entire time, cranking his fastball up to a consistent 96-97 MPH. He notched 5 strikeouts during his outing, but the Phillies had already started to catch up to his speed and started picking off runs in the 4th, 5th, and one in the 6th that Brad Hand would allow.

It was that run in the 6th that was messiest of them all. A freaky sac fly on an infield fly that shouldn't have been called an infield fly, which resulted in a double play and a tying run for the Phils. It was more of a weird mess that could have been messier, and marked the last time the Phils would do any more damage.

The Friars had a big inning in the third with a hard rip down the first base line from Jon Jay to score Alexei Ramierz and Alexi Amarista. Cory Spangenberg got Amarista home on a quick little infield sacrifice. The Wil Myers utterly crushed his second HR of the season on a breaking pitch that stayed up just long enough to say "hi', and then 'bye'.

Then, in the 7th, with runners at the corner and one out, the Padres decided to go with the small ball from the little Ninja. Amarista laid down a sneaky squeeze and snuck Derek Norris in to take the lead. Ninja's call-up from El Paso to fill in with the 15-day DL'd Yangervis Solarte ended up paying off  with a win. He went 1-2 with that bunt-RBI, and put in work at third base.

Amarista's squeeze bunt

Arguably the most crucial piece of the win was the Padres bullpen. Andy Green was presented with his first honest save-situation, and had to make some real calls without the benefit of a 10~ run lead. The combo of Brad Hand, Kevin Quackenbush, Carlos Villanueva, and Fernando Rodney (with his first Friar save of the season) worked flawlessly. With Hand giving up the only run on that ugly error from Ramirez in the 6th, the bullpen crew shut out the Phillies and truly earned the W.

Tomorrow, Robbie Erlin will get his first regular start of the season, filling in for disabled front-man Tyson Ross. He one-hit the Rockies, and has a good record against Philadelphia. He'll hope to last against a previously-sloppy Charlie Morton.