Bob Melvin has called out the Padres publicly. Will it work again?

The San Diego Padres are 19-19 through their first 38 games of the season. We didn’t expect that and neither did Bob Melvin. The Padres manager called out himself and his team after today’s 5-3 loss to the Minnesota Twins.

“We have guys that can perform better, and we’re going to, but it’s time to quit just talking about it. It’s time to go out there and do it,” Melvin said in his postgame press conference. “We’ve just got to fight a little harder and expect a little bit more of ourselves — all of us, myself included. We have not done that to this point. These stretches happen. But it’s gone on too long. We’ve got to break through here at some point.”

Does some of what he said sound familiar? It should because he said these things September 15, 2022 after the Padres lost 4-0 to the Arizona Diamondbacks.

“Didn’t even feel like we put up a fight. Can’t play this way, especially this time of year,” Melvin said following getting shutout by Drey Jameson, who was making his big league debut.

San Diego immediately won five in a row and would finish the regular season 11-7 over their final 18 games after Melvin’s comments so you’d be right to say he woke some of the players up.

Will his words work this time around? They should. This team has too much talent to play just .500 ball.

Manny Machado’s going to keep hitting .250 with a below league average OPS+? Xander Bogaerts is going to continue to hit .138 like he is so far in the month of May? The offense is going to finish the season hitting a league worst .203 with runners in scoring position? I just don’t see that happening.

“I feel like everybody here in this clubhouse is good enough to make it happen. It’s up to us to hold ourselves accountable and (do) the right job,” right fielder Fernando Tatis Jr. told Kevin Acee. “We just gotta play better, period. Whoever we’re playing next, but especially now we’re playing the Dodgers. Division games. They’re very important. So we better step the (expletive) up.”