Yes, the San Diego Padres bullpen yet again blew a late-game lead. There’s no need to panic or scream into a pillow quite yet.

Only one playoff appearance over the last fifteen seasons can easily be a cause of concern. That one playoff appearance coincidentally came in the 60-game COVID season. It’s not a shocker for die-hard fans like my cousin Cameron to start implying “same old Padres”.

It’s a marathon, not a sprint

You’ll never hear me utter, “it’s just one game, it doesn’t matter”. Each game absolutely does matter. A one-game separation after a 162-game season may not happen often. But, it does exist. Just ask the Dodgers last season, they won 106 games and still lost the NL West by one game.

Any given baseball, yes I know that narrative is for football but the shoe fits. In no shape or form are the Diamondbacks better than the Padres. Yet Arizona won the game. This game especially gets highlighted more because it’s simply opening day. If this game was the 10th matchup of the season between the two, the “same old Padres” narrative wouldn’t have left the closet.

Bottom line, the San Francisco Giants had a 5-0 lead in Seattle last season on Opening Day and blew it by allowing 6 runs in the bottom of the 8th. Yet, the Giants finished with an MLB best 107 wins. There are still 161 games to go for these Padres, and I am sure most of those will be wins.

The positives

Yu Darvish anyone? The last time we saw Darvish in the regular-season play he posted a 6.16 ERA in the second half of the season. Last night, Darvish allowed no hits in six innings. That’s what they’ll need from their ace in order to make an NL West push.

Pierce Johnson was a closer candidate before the Padres acquired Taylor Rogers. Last night showed why, Johnson faced five batters, allowed no hits, and struck out three of them. Johnson is a clear go-to arm out of the bullpen.

Eric Hosmer had an extra-base hit! Yes, the other at-bats were the normal groundouts. But, if the Padres still have intentions of moving Hosmer. More extra-base hits would improve his slugging and OPS which would likely help the case for a team to acquire Hosmer and his contract.

Today we will see C.J. Abrams make his anticipated MLB debut. Along with the Padres spring training slugger Jorge Alfaro. These two hitters should help improve the lonely four hits from last night.

These Padres have more than enough firepower to stay in the thick of things this season and one thing we know about A.J. Preller is he won’t give up on the trade market in trying to make this team better. Whether it was game-1 or game-155, I don’t think your expectations should falter one bit.