Tyson Ross will take the mound tonight one game removed from his fantastic eight-inning effort against the Dodgers in which he was unfortunately hung with the loss. He struck out eight and allowed only four hits at Dodger Stadium in a marvelous pitching duel with the 2011 SB Nation Cy Young Award Co-Winner, Clayton Kershaw, and was in line for the victory thanks to a single run of support by the Padres offense. But he made one mistake that led to a two-run homer and the loss. While some people would refuse to give deserved credit to that outing because "he can't make mistakes like that against someone like CLAYTON KERSHAW" or because you don't think pitching is valuable if the hitters aren't there to back it up or something ridiculous like that, the fact is that Tyson was robbed of a(n) [albeit meaningless] win to add to his stats because the Friars offense couldn't get their act together.
And that Padres offense has continued to stutter at the plate lately. They still sit at the bottom of the league in runs scored, OPS, and almost every other offensive stat. In their last five games, they've gone 1-4 while batting an abysmal .171 with an OPS of just .472. They've also struck out 45 times in that stretch - an average of once per inning.
Hopefully the offense can get something even remotely encouraging going against rookie Jimmy Nelson. In eight major league starts this season, Nelson is 2-4 with a 4.15 ERA. He's coming off his shortest appearance in his last six, going 5 2/3 innings and allowing four runs on nine hits. This will be his first time facing San Diego. But unlike Ross, Nelson will have one of the better offenses in the league to back him up.
See how our Padres fare tonight in game 2 against the Brewers, which gets underway at 7:10 PT.
And don't forget to check out today's SB Nation Fantasy Baseball league on FanDuel. It's $2 to join and first prize is $3,000. You can join at this link.