Padres 4, Mets 1

One thing I won't ever do is dress down another Friars fan in public. Any Padres fan is welcome to me, we are all in the same boat, we all suffer together. There is no such thing as a Padre fan complaining, only one licking his wounds. 

Then again, some of our guys on the social media sites might watch some of their predictions blow up in their faces once in a while. Looking at the starting lineup before last night's game in New York, we had Hoz and Grish and Nola. The HORROR! In the end, Hoz and Grish hit a dinger, and Nola got on base twice. Is there any way Melvin or the GM can tweet back about the difference between a fan and an employee in the front office? All three of those players have underachieved, no doubt about it. Nola usually hits .300 or close to it, although his defense will assure he will be platooning at catcher. Grish has never been a high average kind of person, but he gets on base and can be a sparkplug when needed, in addition to his usually stellar play in CF. Hoz is not a bad player, never was, although I'm sure a big fraction of our fans think he hasn't earned his contract. But can all of these veteran players be useful in a pennant race? You bet.

The star of the night was, of course, Yu Darvis. Seven innings, four hits, one run. Good thing, with Max Scherzer on the mound. Scherzer pitched six, two runs allowed, six K's. It's not like we blew him off the mound. We are talking about a starting pitcher, after all, and we don't like hitting starting pitchers, either because they overpower us, because we simply can't eat, we are afraid to hurt their feelings, who knows? In the end, we were the team that can win when scoring four runs. Four does seem to be the magic number.

But hold your horses, Snell is up next, who has won all of one game this year. Best chance to hang up an L immediately after a win. Obviously, after winning Game 1, our goal needs to be to win the series in New York, no? After that, we have three in Detroit, followed by three with the Twins. Out of those nine games with the Mets included, I'd like to see a 6-3 record. We need to move along and start winning some games here in the second half. No pressure.