SD 2, SF 3: Giants Ruin End of April

In a last ditch effort to go .500 for this 10 game road trip, the Padres fall short as the Giants take the series. Here's today's loss, moving forward into May; and how it accurately reflects our previous five failures.

It's the end of the month and in almost a perfect summary of our April, the Padres' bats stayed quiet as the pitching tried desperately to keep the game close. But in our latest 2014 fashion, the Friars are edged out by Giant-headed opponents trailing a single run; going 4-6 in the ten game roadstint we started back on April 21st.

@Brewers L3-4
@Brewers W2-1
@Brewers L2-5
@Nationals W4-3
@Nationals L1-11
@Nationals L0-4
@Nationals W4-2
@Giants W6-4
@Giants L0-6
@Giants L2-3

Tonight it started early, as the Friars gave up runs in the 1st and 2nd inning. It seemed Stults was at a good pace, giving only a lone 1-out hit to Hunter Pence; but Michael Morse would take advantage of this, driving Pence in with a sharp double. Following three-straight Padres ground outs in the 2nd; Brandon Hicks found enough in him to send one deep, putting the Giants up early 2-0.

Cabrera showed off more defensive prowess, proving to everybody that there's no doubt he deserves his spot at short. Consistently turning two, leading the team top 5 in batting, Cabrera has put up some serious April numbers. In fact, he has notched a spot in Padres history. Becoming one of the top 5 performers in the rainy month of April with 33 hits. Other names on this exclusive list are pretty familiar: Adrian Gonzalez with 34 (2007), Ken Caminiti with 37 (1996), and Dave Winfield with 37 (1979).

Cabby adds another two outs to prove his establishment as a defensive staple on the Padres' roster, taking matters into his own hands and turning two to end the 5th.

Our little ninja Alexi Amarista tried his hardest to get us into the game by driving in Cameron Maybin, who reached third on a sweet double and fielder's choice. Although Alexi will never hit for power, he has seemed to pop in every other game to give us a thoughtful little RBI. It's always appreciated, but rarely ever enough.

Amarista squirts one up the middle to put San Diego on the board. Something that, with his limited power, he has been consistent in doing for 8 RBIs in 2014.

Tacking on another run for San Francisco in the 7th, the Giants would push more weight onto the Padres and prove that a 3-0 lead and Tim Hudson are all they needed to pin us down. Hudson had 8.2IP and only gave up 5H, 2ER, 0BB, 6SO, and 1HR. Until Yasmani Grandal's jack in the 9th, Hudson was set to throw a complete game against our boys. But the Giants flinched and hid behind Sergio Romo and cut our rally short.

Grandal crushes a poor little baseball on the Padres' final out; showing that he's packing real power, and that he should have way more than 2 on the season thus far.

Despite throwing for 6 innings, only giving up 8 hits and 3 earned runs. Erlin striking out 5 didn't please the Baseball Gods; and April comes to a crashing close. So where does that leave us for the last 30 days? Let's look at the numbers. Who did we expect to be performing, who busted, and what does this seem to trend for the next month?

Arguably our two club leaders are Cabrera and Denorfia. And whereas Venable is stuck in his standard procedure of struggling all season and breaking out when it doesn't matter, Gyorko has started striking out a lot since his contract extension. Hundley is defying all odds and becoming a reliable bat-off-the-bench. Things are also looking good for the new blood of Cameron Maybin; slipping in three doubles already, and things ended bleak for the old of Chase Headley, who is guaranteed to be on the disabled list for at least the next ten days.

Patterns are revealing Kennedy to be a pleasantly reliable starter. The same goes for ace Andrew Cashner, who has been roughed up his past couple of outings to blur his stats a little. Tyson Ross leads the group in walks, putting almost twice as much as the rest of the pack. And Robbie Erlin and Eric Stults have yet to find their place, giving up the most runs and lasting the least amount of innings.

Despite the rare blowout, we continue to stick to the front of the league in pitching performances; and cruelly towards the very bottom in hitting. This repeatedly explains our flux between one-run games and total shutouts from the opposition. When our team is pitching great; we're not supporting with runs. When our pitchers are being pushed around; our bats look the other way and stay silent like witnessing a mugging in an alley.

If tonight was any indication, we're going to continue to be a very capable group going into May. We have specific problems that warrant specific focus. We have performers; and we have dead weight. At the very least we're not the Diamondbacks right now, who we can look forward to helping us boost out of these funky disorders we've developed.