Game of the Week: July 20: SD @ COL

[Commissioner Erick]

San Diego Padres (42-50) @ Colorado Rockies (51-43)


SD: Adalberto Mejia (6-6, 3.33)
COL: Kevin Horney (7-5, 5.36)


On July 8th, the San Diego Padres sat 41-43, just five games out of the NL West lead. It was a day after a resounding ninth-inning comeback win in Cleveland, San Diego's second straight last at bat win. Tied going into the ninth inning that day, Phil Maton allowed a double to Mike Papi and a walk-off sacrifice fly to Yangervis Solarte to miss an opportunity to gain ground that day.

That loss begat six more in a row and the Padres are now in need of some major wins to get back into the playoff picture.

They can pick one up tonight and move closer to the NL West lead when the San Diego Padres hit the road and visit the Colorado Rockies.

The Padres schedule presents an opportunity to gain ground. The Rockies currently lead the NL West so wins over them directly will bring the Padres closer to the top of the NL West. San Diego then plays the Giants and Mets, last place teams the both of them. A strong close to the month could see the Padres up near .500 to finish the month.

The team will need its high-priced players to play better though to make that happen.

Nearly all the major acquisitions A.J. Preller made this offseason have backfired. A doubles machine and offensive stalwart in San Francisco, Brandon Belt has had a miserable year. His .319 slugging percentage is the lowest in the league outside of former teammate Brandon Crawford. Belt's stunning decline has starved the Padres of offensive firepower.

Jonathan Schoop was brought on board to provide right-handed power. Schoop had a strong World Baseball Classic, but one that prevented him from fully learning left field in Spring Training. He came back, struggled defensively, suffered heart palpitations from the stress, and hit for a .445 OPS before being traded to Seattle.

Jake Odorizzi was brought on as a back-end starter, and while his underlying metrics are within career norms, he's turning in the worst year of his career, with a 4-10 record and a 5.23 ERA. Yu Darvish has been worse, suffering maladies on all portions of his right arm, and working to a 6.75 ERA and 0-3 record in his seven starts.

Ron Fowler is happy and the clubhouse is in good shape, so there likely won't be drastic changes. However, this is not an inspiring performance from the team's staff, and is the kind of situation that puts people on the hot seat.

From the hot seat to the hot bat, Josh Ockimey will be in the lineup for Colorado today, even against lefty Adalberto Mejia. Erick Blasco originally planned to platoon Ockimey and play Trevor Story at shortstop, but Ockimey has forced his hand. Ockimey's 28 home runs are third in the National League, his .619 slugging mark is second to Bryce Harper, and Ockimey's paired the power with a .289 average. Impressively for Blasco, he's hit .319 with nine home runs against left-handed pitching in just 70 plate appearances. He's been a revelation since being picked in the second round of the Rule V draft from Boston before 2019.

If the game is close, the Rockies can also count on their amazingly tops bullpen in the league. After a pair of down seasons, Greg Holland has been spectacular as a closer, saving 17 of 18 opportunities. His strikeout rate plummeted last year, his home run rate shot up, and his walk numbers increased as well. Holland has reversed all those trends, elevating himself to be a top-tier closer again.

Meanwhile, a pair of lefties have provided tremendous support in the middle innings. Sam Moll has the third best ERA in PBA history among pitchers who have worked at least 150 innings. Never highly regarded, Moll is terrific at working the corners and getting great downward movement from a slider that simply misses the sweet spot of bats. Blasco's manager bot has deployed Moll an even 50% against lefties and righties. Moll's slider is much more effective against lefties and Moll should be deployed in that manner.

Xavier Cedeno, meanwhile, has been deployed more often against righties and it hasn't bothered him a bit. Lefties are hitting just .203 with a .580 OPS, but righties are hitting .184 with a .564 OPS. Cedeno's always had great stuff, but he's stopped giving up home runs and limited his walks on the way to an All-Star appearance. His walk rate is still high, but Cedeno's a very smart worker and has known when to make the important pitch to get the key out this year.

That bullpen has been a weapon for the Rockies and has allowed them to leap out to an NL West lead.


Questions for the GMs:


For Ryan Davis, with the Dodgers struggling and your team hanging around, your squad was well within the hunt for the NL West. Now the Dodgers have activated and the Rockies are beginning to pull away. What is your deadline strategy as a result of these factors?

So many of your big acquisitions have played poorly. Looking back, was there a specific blind spot you didn't know you had?

Allen Cordoba was doing a nice job as a left fielder. Do you feel trading for Eugenio Suarez and moving Cordoba to left was better than trading for a left fielder?

For Erick Blasco, you haven't made many deals this season, but now the Dodgers are playing well and are on your heels. How does this affect your deadline strategy?

David Dahl has a finger blister. Will he play today against the lefty Mejia?

Your starters have not done well, but Riley Pint is tearing it up in the minors. Any thoughts of calling him up?

[rdavispadres]

1. I don't think we have a specific deadline strategy at this point. We don't think it is necessary to mortgage the future for a shot at the playoffs this year. If the opportunity presents itself we'd be willing to talk on players under control past this season but there aren't many of those on the market.

2. I don't think we played any of our acquisitions poorly. I don't see how anyone would've guessed that Belt would be one of the worst hitters in baseball, that's just something you can't predict. Odorizzi's numbers are inflated by his last start against Philly, otherwise he's still been pretty good. I'd take him for 1 year 4 mil any day of the week even with his current performance. Darvish is always a risk but with the depth we've built on the mound I'm not super worried. He still has only 7 starts under his belt so I expect his numbers to even out a bit. Overall the pitching has been fantastic but offensively we just can't get anything going. I think that has more to do with poor development than it does offseason oversights.

3. Cordoba's value lies in his defensive versatility and with Suarez we saw a guy with a good offensive profile available for cheap. I wouldn't say acquiring Suarez over a left fielder was a better move but at this point it's all about acquiring offense regardless of position and I'm just lucky Cordoba can play anywhere on the diamond at an elite level.

[Commissioner Erick]

For Erick Blasco, you haven't made many deals this season, but now the Dodgers are playing well and are on your heels. How does this affect your deadline strategy?


Like Ryan, it doesn't affect anything, though for different reasons. We're overbudget right now and we like our team, so we're not in the position to add more players. We feel like we have a key addition when Raimel Tapia comes back, and we have some pitching in the minors if we need them. We feel we have a deeper roster than the Diamondbacks and Dodgers, and we're not scared of their staff if Kershaw is removed. With Trevor Story hitting better, we feel that we're the team to beat in the West and its the Dodgers that will need to react to us.

David Dahl has a finger blister. Will he play today against the lefty Mejia?


We thought about sitting him, but the injury is really minor and likely won't be made worse. He'll play today as even against lefties, he's a dynamic hitter. Even if he can't hit, he'll be strong in center for us.


Your starters have not done well, but Riley Pint is tearing it up in the minors. Any thoughts of calling him up?

We're trying to keep him down so we don't have to play waiver wire games and we can keep his service time down a little. He's developed wonderfully this year and is really tearing up Double A. We'll likely have him up in September, but with Peter Lambert replacing Chi Chi Gonzalez in the rotation, and with Jon Gray turning in a strong start against the Mets, we're hoping this can be our rotation going forward.

[Commissioner Erick]

Rockies 14 - Padres 7

WP: K. Horney (8-5)
LP: A. Mejia (6-7)


The Colorado Rockies have a lot of sluggers, and those sluggers were able to get the long ball going Monday night. The Rockies also had the bottom of their order getting on base all game, fueling their sluggers.

With that feedback loop in place, the Colorado Rockies were able to blitz the San Diego Padres, hitting five home runs on the way to a 14-7 win.

Colorado had no issues blasting off against Adalberto Mejia, touching him up for seven runs, four earned, over 4 innings. A Jake Lamb error was responsible for three unearned runs in the second, and Mejia never recovered.

Tom Murphy, who had a huge game and scored four runs, hit a two-out double in the second. Mejia then balked, which frazzled Mejia, before Steven Souza Jr. hit a grounder down the third base line. Lamb had the ball glance off his glove for an error, which further compounded Mejia's frustrations. Mejia next caught too much plate with a fastball, and Rockies slugger Josh Ockimey deposited it over the right-field fence for a two-run home run.

Nolan Arenado and Trevor Story went back-to-back in the third, with Story's shot a solo shot where he inside-outed an inside fastball to right field for a home run. It wasn't a bad pitch, but Mejia allowed two ground hits and two walks to follow, including a bases loaded walk to Charlie Blackmon to make it 7-1 Rockies.

Ryan Buchter came on to work the fifth and that's where the Padres lost control of the game. Buchter walked Murphy and Souza Jr. to begin the inning. After he retired Ockimey, he got ahead of Travis Demeritte 0-2 before nailing him with a slider. On a full count to Blackmon, with the bases full, instead of walking him like Mejia did, Buchter threw a fastball and Blackmon hit it 396 feet to left-center field to blow the game wide open.

The bottom of the lineup was the star for Colorado. Murphy, Souza Jr., Ockimey, and Demeritte went 7-14 with a hit-by-pitch, a reach via an error, and four walks. They scored 10 times, with Murphy tying a Rockies record with four times scored. They hit two home runs and drove in three. Those times on base though fueled leadoff hitter Blackmon to drive in six with his big day.

Error notwithstanding, San Diego got a nice offensive performance from Jake Lamb. Lamb homered, had three hits, scored three runs, and stole a base. San Diego made good use of the base runners they had, scoring seven runs and only leaving two on base. Mejia was too frustrated to pitch well and Buchter didn't have any command. For a rare time this season, San Diego's pitching let its offense down.


Questions for the GMs:


For Ryan Davis, Luis Torrens pinch-hit for Brandon Belt late in the game. Is there any chance Torrens takes over for Belt at first going forward?

Lamb has had a tough year, but he looked great hitting in Coors Field and homered in his second straight game. Any idea where his power has been all year, and why it's surfacing now?

Does this lose officially have you in next-season mode for the rest of the year?

For Erick Blasco, Chi Chi Gonzalez was bombed in relief. What role will he have going forward?

Travis Demeritte got on base three times. Do you feel like he's turning things around?

Allen Cordoba and Luis Urias were held in check. How did you handle those two?

[Commissioner Erick]

For Erick Blasco, Chi Chi Gonzalez was bombed in relief. What role will he have going forward?


Gonzalez hasn't been as reliable as he was last year. He's given up so many line drives and he's lost his command. He's probably done as a starter for us now and we may just use him as a long man and a mop-up man going forward. We're starting to become more amenable to calling up Riley Pint if we need another starter.

Travis Demeritte got on base three times. Do you feel like he's turning things around?


Not really, honestly. He doesn't hit the ball hard and he misses so often when he swings. His defense is okay and he has good numbers against lefties, but second base is our weakest position and we're going to have Demeritte hitting ninth down the line as he's our weakest bat.


Allen Cordoba and Luis Urias were held in check, going 0-3 against Horny each. How did you handle those two?

Kevin Horney likes to throw up in the zone and inside with velocity, and Horny has decent command. We trusted that those two wouldn't reliably punish Horny by turning him around inside with extra base hits. Cordoba bunted on the first pitch of the game and Urias swung and hit a weak grounder, so maybe those two gave Horny outs early on. However, Horny kept getting to two strikes to Cordoba and his curveball forced a lot of weak grounders by Cordoba. Urias had some trouble with Horny working at the top of the zone though, and that was by design.