If there’s one surefire way to lose a baseball game, it’s putting up a big fat goose egg with runners in scoring position, and that’s exactly what the Padres did as they went a brutal 0-for-11 this afternoon. You can’t fault the pitching, as Luis Perdomo allowed just one run in six innings, with the bullpen backing him up to the tune of two runs over five frames. Three starters went hitless today, and only one of them bothered to draw a walk to make up for it. It’s a terrible way to lose a series that started so well.
The Rockies got on the board early, with Ian Desmond and Mark Reynolds opening the second with back-to-back singles. Our old friend Alexi Amarista came up to the plate and hit another single to put Colorado up 1-0. The inning could have been much worse had Perdomo not teamed up with Austin Hedges for a strike-em-out, throw-em-out double play.
Before the Padres finally scored in the bottom of the seventh, Ryan Hanigan took Ryan Buchter yard to double the Rockies’ lead. Yangervis Solarte had seen enough of that, so he worked a one-out walk and then hustled home on a Hunter Renfroe double. Then Ryan Schimpf took a walk to put the go-ahead run on base with one out... and Corey Spangenberg struck out on three pitches, with Hector Sanchez grounding out right behind him.
But the eighth was when they well and truly blew it. Adam Ottavino started the bottom of the inning by walking Luis Sardinas and Manuel Margot on nine pitches. Then Erick Aybar got a meaty pitch down the middle on a 2-1 count... and hit a fly ball. A wild pitch advanced both runners, and then Wil Myers drew another walk to load the bases. That ended Ottavino’s day, but with one out, Jake McGee mitigated the damage by getting Solarte to ground out, which scored the tying run, but set up Hunter Renfroe to end the inning on a pop fly.
The game stayed tied until the eleventh, when a second inning of work took its toll on Hand. He walked Trevor Story with one out, but got Desmond to ground out in what looked like a good sign. It wasn’t. Reynolds singled and Amarista walked, bringing up Hanigan to score the game-winning single.
Hopefully Jhoulys Chacin gets more support tomorrow as he faces the Dodgers. First pitch at 7:10.