Padres follow up a walkoff win with another walkoff win

A couple of bombs and some bottom of the ninth and extra inning magic were needed to keep the Royals winless at Petco Park.

The buzz going into the series was how the young, hard-throwing Yordano Ventura would be taking the mound to face the light hitting Friars. But, a new buzz popped up on game day with the announcement that Kyle Blanks would be called up and start at first base. Ventura would live up to his hype while Blanks would not.

Ventura showed his fastball that comes with built in flame trails and some excellent breaking stuff to strikeout out 8 Padres on the night. Blanks went 0 for 2 before being swapped with Yonder Alonso as part of a double switch. The swap came when Eric Stults had to be yanked after only four and 2/3 innings. Stults did not get hit hard, but the plenty of ground balls found holes and soft liners fell short of outfielders' gloves. In total 11 of the 23 hitters that face Stults got base hits and it resulted in 3 runs against the left-hander.

In contrast Ventura cruised into 6th inning allowing only 2 hits and no walks with no runs plated till that point. Then, after retiring Will Venable for his 8th whiffed Padre of the game, he gave up a single to the 5.5 hole to Everth Cabrera, a double to Seth Smith and 3 run home run to cleanup hitter Yasmani Grandal. The bomb to right field came after a great at bat by Grandal where he battled Ventura's tough pitches until he got one he could wallop. The clutch dinger would tie the game at 3 apiece going into the late innings.

The Royals would answer quickly. Nick Vincent entered the game to start the 7th, and after easily retire the first batter he gave up a screaming liner for a solo home run to Eric Hosmer. The Padres would answer that as well, but not nearly as quickly. The Padres went down quietly in the 7th and 8th while Dale Thayer and Alex Torres would keep the deficit at one. Then in the bottom of the 9th, with two outs separating the Royals from their first ever win at Petco Park, Jedd Gyorko took Kansas City closer Greg Holland deep to left field to knot it up at 4.

The game would stay knotted until the 12th. Huston Street and Joaquin Benoit would keep it that way, but when Tim Stauffer took over in the 12th a Salvador Perez double and a 2 out Mike Moustakas RBI single would give the Royals another 1 run lead. But as this game had went all night, a score by one team must be answered by the other.

In the bottom of the 12th the Padres would find a way to walk off in back to back nights. Chris Denorfia started it off with a single and the Padres tried to play for a tie by having Alexi Amarista bunt him over to 2nd. Yonder Alonso who had the game winning RBI in the previous game spoiled that strategy by hitting a shallow pop up that could not be caught. Alonso would hustle to second, but Denorfia had to hold up and only got to 3rd. The man who would win for the Padres was Will Venable. 0 for 5 on the night, Venable would lace a ball to right center field that would never be caught or even chased down. The Padres were at last victorious. Here's to sticktoitiveness.