Bethancourt, Amarista pitch relief after Padres fall apart

It doesn't get much worse than a total blowout like that. Seth Smith and the rest of the Seattle Mariner crew pummeled the Padres for the 2-game Safeco series sweep. Five innings of straight-up torment.

James Shields was a lowlight today in a performance that probably didn't do any favors for his "trade value". He figuratively lasted until the third inning, and was credited with 10 earned runs. That's 10 runs, 14 hits, and 2 home runs off of one man. It's tough to say the Padres offense could have done anything against that, but Luis Perdomo came in to pile on the suck giving up 3 home runs and 6 earned runs.

Seth Smith made sure Padres fans didn't forget his generic face and name, and cranked two of those home runs off both Shields and Perdomo. Then, other than three retaliating home runs from Travis Jankowski (his first of the season) Matt Kemp (his thirteenth, and Hector Sanchez (his first as well), there was all but a shutout blowout against the Mariners.

The silver lining of scenarios like this in the first half of the season is that you get to see position players pitch. It's a treat in baseball that doesn't see indulgence until the most desperate of scenarios. San Diego's desperation called for catcher Christian Bethancourt to take the mound.

Bethancourt threw a 53 MPH pitch that barely registered on FoxTrax. It was declared an eephus, and at least put a smile on everybody's faces among the mess-of-a-game.

Coming in for some quality relief to help the Friars escape a bases-loaded scenario was Alexi Amarista, who was the last Padres position player to take the mound back in 2015. He pulled it off with a courteous groundout.

From what I can see, that's a solid 0 ERA for the Ninja in his pitching career.

The Friars get to come back to San Diego tomorrow to finish the second half of the series. Christian Friedrich will go up against King Felix Hernandez, where the Pads can hopefully put on a better show for the home crowd.