YOU KNOW WHAT MY DAY WAS MISSING?

A Sean Burroughs article. Don't get me wrong, I had already read one here, but I was emopants because I wanted TWO! Now I can finish off my 9th Slurpee in peace.

PADRES SWEEP!!!

And winners of 7 of the last 8. Over that time period the rallies that the team has put together seem to all have the same characteristics: they come with 2 outs and they all consist of mostly singles. There were 6 hits in our 4 run 3rd inning, and 5 of them were singles, while 5 hits ALL the runs came with two outs in the frame. I think Patty Ice should change his 'one nut out of the pants rally' to now having both nuts swinging free, one for each out there is whilst we start knocking in runs.

I think that the biggest game of the last 8 (series with Boston, Atlanta and Kansas City) was the rubber match last Sunday where Lubke got nasty on ATL. He could have easily have been rocked and possibly have caused a momentum killer, however he was aggressive, ballsy, confident in his 1 hit performance and we end up taking 2 of 3, keeping confidence up from the (chaotic) Boston series. Next thing you know we have the first winning homestand of the year. Fuhkyea.

GOALS

Jed Hoyer said that before the Padres can think about contending in the NL West (muffled giggle) we have to get to .500. I think that there should be immediate smaller-scale priorities that come before either of those goals:

1. Have a better record than the Marlins and the Doyers.

Why? Pride basically. Those are the two biggest cluster-f***s in all of MLB, and if it weren't for the Clippers, probably at the top in all of sports. There is no way that the JV, who have an owner in place that's not a sleeze or a con man (for LA and FLA respectively), a awsome new downtown staduim (FLA's is the Debbie Downer of home parks), a smart young GM in Jed, and a fan base that's not putting people in comas should have a worse record than these two teams. We're better than that on literally every level.

2. Increase our production with runners in scoring position.

Sunday's win was a great 4-1 W, but we still left 11 or 12 men on base. We were fortunate to run into some offensive luck and a reliever not totally on his game, but in general we need to cut down on that shit -- plus it makes for terrible games.

3. Keep people healthy.

Obvious. But seeing Maybin round the bases, hustle down the line to beat throws, and Orlando Hundson being clutch still makes me think what-if for this season.

4. Get the Petco winning % up.

What's the point of dreaming about the playoffs if you can't win at home?

5. Get to .500
6. Contend.
7. Make Jonathan Sanchez cry, because he is an awful, awful man. Speaking of, has it been like 2 months since we've played LA or SF?
/ Too lazy to look up schedule.

GETTIN OLD

Here's a nice, nine page read about baseball, age and adjustments from The NYTimes Magazine.

TALKIN TRADES, BULL PEN, EXPECTATIONS, BEER FARTS

Buster Olney reported on a possible Heath Bell trade to Philadelphia. Let's assume that happens, as well it probably should.

Taking away all the given negatives of losing an all-star, heavy-set, funny as hell, sprint your ass-off out of the pen looking like a chubby kid chasing an ice cream truck, closer, is our 'pen strong enough to take that hit and with in reason still be stellar?

I think if we are to consider this, we have to directly correlate it with the questions: Is Mike Adams ready to close games out on the regular? If so should we trade both Bell and Adams and load up on prospects?

I think probably, and no.

I think that if Gregorson doesn't lose any nasty on that slider and move him to 8th, and we can throw maybe Qualls in the 7th, Adams can do well anchoring The Yoda Backpacks. He's been the All-Star on the team this season, and he's been dominating for years now. He's the man. Here's the rub -- he doesn't strike me as a closer. Just his composure - which is to say he has good, calm, collected composure - makes me feel he doesn't match the mold of fiercely competitive, lil bit insane, with down right intimidating stuff closer that I'm used to seeing. Heath has all three of those. Hoffy had that intensity. Hard. And during his hay, that hall-of-fame-dirty change up made hitters look so foolish it was insane.

Now objectively rebuilding is exactly that, and if we need to wipe the slate and plan for 2013+beyond then so be it. As an intelligent fan base we can't expect us to take the actions to rebuild and then be surprised with the consequences. For example yesterday I had four slices of big-ass slices of CostCo pizza, a large big mac meal, and double digits of cheap beer, and now the next day I'm drinking a large coffee. Consequence: beer-fartin up a storm, sitting here in my own stank barely able to function. Is it lame? Stanky? Pot-belly inducing? Yes. And I accept these consequences because I know that I like fun. 


However subjectively, and probably selfishly, the San Diego Padres have had a All-Star-ish closer for SIXTEEN years now in a row. Sixteen. Since I've cared about baseball, the Padres have played dozens of 8 inning games every year. It might be a little bit sentimental, but I don't want to imagine my team auditioning closers, trying to see who fits, waiting for them to blow 4 or 5 and then move on to someone else. That's not My Padres. As far as trading both, please don't trade big Mike Adams. 1st of all he's my mom's favorite player and I don't want to deal with those repercussions. But also if we lost both I think that would be so demoralizing voluntarily giving up the two best parts of the only good part of our team, it might turn the season from a bad circus to a full blown shit-show and no one wants to see that.

Thus I'm torn between knowing we need to rebuild, and wanting to keep the one consistent positive aspect about the franchise in tact.

WAS THAT NOT THE QUIETEST SERIES WIN OF ALL TIME?

I watched the first game/ass-faced-catastrophe. For reasons abundant demoralization (actually it was also .40 cent wing night) I didn't watch the second game, but I endured the 3rd game, and who'da thunk it, the Friars take 2 out of 3 in Boston! Pop the 2-buck-chuck and heat up the rice-a-roni.

Let's break this shit down to generalizations and vague impressions:

Game 1: Harrang should have been out there. The 'pen gave up double digit runs, which will happen a couple times a decade. Trounced. It happens.

Game 2: Josh Beckett should have been out there. The newly able-listed Maybin and Hundley combine to go 3 for 6, 2 RBIs and 2 runs scored and the Pads eek out a 5-4 win behind Matty Latos.

Game 3: A gift and a mess at the same time, an 8 inning 5-1 victory. Like a three-year old drawing a picture of his father for the dad's birthday. Luckily for us John Lackey pitched like Manny Rodriguez used to hustle gifting us 2 runs on hit-by-pitches with the bases drunk and serving up a lead off jack (JACK) to Mr. Will Venable. Clayton loaded the bases in the 1st got out of it by getting Ortiz to ground out, and Richard was stellar through two rain delays and 5+ innings, and eventually the game was called due to rain.

It's hard to absorb the series win after Monday, but we did it! Great for us? I'm Ron Burgundy? For me seeing Hundley break out of his 0-for streak, seeing O-Dog back running the bases, and to have Chase stay hot where all positives. Now if we can only awaken Rizzo; I'm still keeping the faith in the Friars. Every team has to get hot sometime yeah?

Stat of Week...

I have to thank Tim Kurkjian on Sportscenter the other day for this one. The 2011 Padres had been shut out 11 times through 67 games while the New York Yankees were shut out 11 times in a 5 year span from 1930-1934. I know we dont have the Yankee payroll but we should be able to at least get a few clutch hits every now and then.
         Big Kevin (Leavitt)

Hit and run

No not hit and run as in the baseball sense, hit and run car collision! On my 7 minute drive to work  I all of a sudden feel my self lunge forward only to look to the right to see a mustang with a busted front left corner. The young punk asshole then blazes 80 mph down the road weaving through traffic until a light hindered me from following him til he ran out of gas and unleashing a fortnights worth of fists on his face.

So what does this have to do with baseball. Well everything and nothing at all. After my rage subsided I turned on the radio for the rest of the 2 minute drive to work hoping to hear some good sd sports news on scott and br (one of the best sports shows and totally hilarious). Scott however had to remind me that we were on a path of utter doom, flying to boston for a beat down of all beat downs by yours truely, adrian gonzalez. Are you serious? We lose the last bajillion games (sorry I lost count) and now we gotta go play the red sox!?!?! So yes the 14-5 score at the end of the game neither surprised me nor made my day any better. At least I only got hit and run on and not hit and runOVER damn.

Well theres not a lot to say about the 2011 JV padres right now. They flat out can't hit, play defense, pitch that well, run very well just to name a few. What it comes down to is that the loss of adrian gonzalezs' bat, glove and leadership was just too much to handle. It was VERY wishful thinking by padres management to think they could replace adrian with two players who even combined SUCK.  The only thing thats even keeping this team from flat out being sent to the minors is the pitching. Even though it hasnt been as dominant as last year, at least the pitchers showed up to play this year.

I think the biggest question for me has to be, when does the baseball culture in san diego change? At some point we will have to sign our best players to long term deals instead of building them up and when they get too expensive, trade them away or let them walk. I know most people will say " if we had signed adrian we wouldn't have any money for anyone else".  BUT WHEN ARE WE EVER GOING TO HAVE ENOUGH MONEY TO PAY THE GOOD PLAYERS! At some point management is gonna have to put up some extra dough to build a team. Trying to build budget teams just isn't working and were gonna be stuck in this same cycle forever.  Its either that or produce some home grown hitters! I mean seriously, when was the last time the padres actually drafted someone who ended up moving up through our system and turning into a star. I really don't think its been since Tony Gwynn and thats a long long time ago.

So I have officially come up with 3 of the GREATEST IDEAS OF ALL TIME! The first idea is to drink heavily with Matt every single game. Id play beer pong and make one cup for every run the padres  get therefore losing everygame and having to drink a shit ton. So effectively.... WINNING! Next idea is to have moorad killed by the russian mafia and the team sold to mark cuban. Have you seen that guy wear that retarded looking mavs championship hat, the guy is a straight baller. But in all serious ness  the guy spent like 90,000 dollars on ONE bottle of champagne that night they won! Think about the team we could have with his dough! And lastely instead of having the lowest payroll teams get money from the rich teams (which never seems to get spent improving the teams), the worst 8 teams would get an exception to the steriods rule. I mean those 8 teams wouldn't have the best hitters and thus they would still strikeout a bunch. The extra power would give those teams just enough extra home runs to even out the playing field.

Or maybe this beer and that hit and run have finally messed up my brain. My blogs are starting to deteriorate like the padres. At least I can still hope that Rizzo ends up being a beast. Until next time, your always faithful friar (even though i want to win oh so badly) Patty Ice

CHASE HEADLY GOES 4 FOR 5!!

AWESOME! Didn't catch anything else about the game, hope we won.

SOME FORMER PADRES FIRST BASEMAN

is having a real tough time adjusting to his new league:

http://espn.go.com/mlb/statistics

I hadn't noticed his stat line really, and now that I know I'm not all that glad I checked. It's like having an ex-girlfriend, and it just so happens we are both invited to the same three-day party June 20th-22nd at her house. She's rollin in with a boob job and a new car her boyfriend bought her after her promotion at work, and we've heading in to this shindig after we've moved back into our parents' spare room, blisters on our hands, and pissed that Dad filled up the Netflix with 3 seasons of Everybody Loves Raymond but psyched that Mom remembered to get our favorite cereal at the store.......Not like that shit's happened to me before................

It's hard times in Friarland: after losing five straight, 8 out of our last 9, being swept by the (equally as) lowly Twins, reaching 600 team Ks for the season, giving up 3 unearned runs late to lose on Father's Day. Now the beaten and bruised Friars are heading to Fenway to face the one of the hottest teams in baseball in the Boston Red Sox.

I'm dreading these three days in June.

That's why Patty Ice and I have made a commitment to drink during this particular inter-league series. Doesn't have to be a rager, but this next few days might be painful and poppa needs some sweet and tender medicine to lull away the night terrors. But hey if you have the time and the means to rage, let's make up some spiteful drinking game rules:

1. Drink every time Adrian comes up, and then once more for every base he touches during that at-bat.
2. Drink for every runner the Padres strand.
3. Drink every time the Padres go down in order.
4. Drink twice for every error, and twice more for every un-earned runs.
5. Drink at the start of every half-inning you are glad Dick Endberg is not in the booth.
6. Drink every time you unknowingly let out a loud sigh.
7. Drink whenever a Padres batter hitting below .250 comes up.
8. Drink for every extra-base hit given up by the Friar staff, twice for every run.
9. Drink whenever a Boston fan is on camera doing something obnoxious.

IN HONOR OF FATHER'S DAY

Here is the opinion of my Dad on the 2011 Padres:

"Gat-damn they're boring. At the end of the day baseball is supposed to be entertaining, and lately it's just no fun to watch."

Pop has a point. To give you some reference on my parents, they go to about 25+ games a year, and if they go to a really good game they have been known to come home and watch the replay on Channel 4 of the game they just went to -- they are not people with huge expectations of constant entertainment. But you've got to give them something.

Obviously, it's the league-worst offense that results in the snooze-a-thons. But also they Padres usually only score runs in the 7th inning or later (or if in extra-innings, never) and with our leet pitching staff, you are looking at a 90ish minute commitment to dullness before anything of note happens, especially anything of positive note. So far it's just been one of those hang-with-em seasons yea?

FRANCHISE EXPECTATIONS, AND HORRENDOUS CULTURE OF CHAMPIONSHIP JOCKING

A while back I think it was ESPN had an article that paired MLB teams with Premier League teams. So the article would say that if you are  Yankees fan, then you should follow Chealsy, Bo Sox were Man U etc etc. The Padres were paired with Fullham F.C and in the lil blurb summary the articled said something along the lines of 'both fan bases love their teams but do not expect championships'. It's sad for die-hards and the Faithful, but for baseball in America's Finest City, that's entirely true.

What should be the expectations for our franchise?
What do we as fans and ticket buyers generally expect?
Should we demand World Series title(s) from our team?

First and foremost, we in San Diego are not clamoring for championships because we live in Southern California. It's beautiful, there's a lot to do but no pressure to always be doing something, and if you want to go outside and enjoy your life with the windows down and the taco stand open, you can do it 340 days a year. Even Petco feels more like an artistic sandstone addition to the Gaslamp Quarter and, not necessarily negatively, gives the feeling of little homage to the old tenants of the houses of baseball that other newer parks like SF and MIL have incorporated into the design. We live in paradise. Do we want to watch a big league ball game? Absolutely. But is it cool if our boys of summer don't make the playoffs? Yes. Generally it's because we can still go to the beach in December, and nobody says 'wicked pissah' to us ever. 

THIS WEEK IN HATE: ONLINE COMMERCIALS

The pendulum has swung back to the point where now I want to see more commercials online. To be more specific, I want to see varied commercials online, and not have the same ones over and over like I'm in a police stand-off and they are playing Yani on loop to get me to come out. I've watched almost every game this season online at MLB.TV, and although the DVR function definitely has its benefits and its issues, by far the biggest hate I have is the commercials.

I have accepted that there has to be commercials/advertisements in the world, the system is a necessity to fund the fancy light-pictures I watch as entertainment/friend-filler. So acknowledging that there has to be commercials, can we at least get some different ones? Good or bad, just change it up!

I've memorized every tick and inflection in the MLB Umpire Camp (at the Urban Youth Academy in Compton) spot from last month. I used to love (as much as one can) Coors Light, until that jackass baby goat pick up line commercial runs at me 18 times a game. It's always the same terrible two or three commercials in a loop. I only half watch most things online because of that deficit of attention so I can usually block that stuff out, but what distracts me from being distracted is now annoyed my subconscious is with this terrible ads are and I end up muting the computer and the next thing I know, I've missed two innings where the Padres got runners on 1st and 3rd with one out and failed to score because the computer's sound was muted and I forgot about it.

Are they really not selling ANY advertising space? Is that why they have to sell the whole block to one company? If so, Lexus needs to step the damn game up and get five or six spots up.

SOLUTION:

DO CLOSERS NEED A SAVE SITUATION TO BE EFFECTIVE?

Over the last five games Heath Bell has given up four runs now in two games (2 runs a piece) where the score was tied in the 9th. I feel like Hoffy had similar issues over his years and so that got me wondering if the mindset is different for a closer coming into a tied game, if they need that competitive edge of having the game on the line. I know people who are at their best if you shit-talk them, so any fuel for the fire probably helps a lot.

The Big Kid got a lot of work over the last two plus weeks yeah? So I don't know if he's rusty. I'm def not pinning this loss on him, ya gotta score one run over nine people to even contemplate to win (we are 1-18 in games where we score one run...soooo maybe we gotta score two?).

Is Heath strictly a save-situation pitcher in our 'pen?

OUR OWN MEDICINE SUCKS

The Nats have been giving us a taste of our own medicine the last two games, winning back to back 2-1 games against our Pads with stellar starting and relief pitching. It's always funny in baseball to see the headlines for 2-1 games. The winning team's headlines will be 'our pitching is the bomb', and the losing team's headlines will always be 'our bats sucked this game'. So even though both headlines were true, our bats sucked more than their bats, and their pitching was better than our awesome (Clayton Richard takes the loss after a great outing giving up 2 ER) pitching, and Ryan Ludwick's missed dive cos the Friars a run and ended up being the deciding factor.

Either way, like in April, we are one well-timed double away from winning almost every game we lose.

Oh and Rizzo? Yes. Check. Down. Sold. I've been geekin out over Rizzo's swing. Choked down so far his right hand is barely on the knob. Long, extended cut. Pure power. He had a HR and a double today. Are lifetime contracts possible??

Now if only ___, ____, ____, _____, ____, and ____ (insert any names) were actually getting (timely) hits we could start winning ball games. Going for the series split tomorrow. C'Mon Pads!

Seriously...

I couldnt believe my eyes a few days ago when I was reading through ESPN's baseball rumors and found out Clay Hensley was injured striking out Sean Burroughs. Haha I thought it was a misprint but i checked the stats. http://arizona.diamondbacks.mlb.com/stats/sortable_player_stats.jsp?c_id=ari He has 20 at basts this season. This made me feel a little better about the Padres free agent signings this year.

WHAT I'M PSYCHED ABOUT:

Summertime, girls in sundresses, Harry Potter XII.5, and the new season of Breaking Bad. Oh, I thought this was my livejournal. For the Padres I'm psyched about health.

Everyone is Rizzo-o-oed out right now and that's great - that's beyond great. But I am psyched to finally begin reassembling the starting 9 that Mr. Hoyer and Mr. Moorad built, and get them back playing ball again. It started with Mr. Hundley catching today's 5-3 loss. I don't like losing, I hate losing when it's not even our team out there! If I don't hear "Forshyth up with two on and two out in a tied ball game" for the rest of the season I'd be satisfied.

I am going to generalize here, but Hawp and Luddy are hitting like .300 the last month equally with a butt-ton of RBIs, and a nice dose of swag too. However Daddy Long Legs Maybin has been out for the better part of their hot streak, as has Hundley, and Orlando Hudson. That's 3/8ths of the intended starters NOT taking the field everyday, and it's come at a time when our two offense powers are at their hottest. If Ryan and Brad were doing what they've been doing lately during the first 30 days, and if everyone was healthy during their hot streak in the last 30 days, then the headlines, and the standings, would be very different. Beleeddat.

Yeah, I'm excited to see how Rizzo is going to handle The Show. But I want to see MY Padres play together even more. I feel a good summer ahead, and for other reasons besides sundresses.

Stay healthy friends, stay away from free bar nuts, and GO Padres

matt

YOU JUST GOT STAUFFED!

The Rockies got rocked tonight by Stauffer's GEM and I don't mean in just the pitching sense! Not only did he bust out career bests in strikeouts and innings pitched at 8 a piece but he helped himself to a 2 hit night with a critical rbi. Tonight he was going for a dirty, messy kill and there was nothing that was going to stop him. I swear when he hit that rbi he had transformed into the ROCK and was swinging a fence post at every Rockie player trying to knock them the freak out! AWESOME GAME!

TONIGHT WAS TRUELY PADRES BASEBALL!

Great pitching, good defense, and timely hitting. All the things that helped the Giants win the world series last year. My hat really goes off to stauff though, he has been our most consistent pitcher (besides bell, adams and gregerson haha) since returning to padres from AAA. I mean whats not to like about this guy? Great stuff, decent fastball, great location, and great composure. To me he draws comparisons to Greg Maddux, not dominating overpowering stuff, but always consistent and gets the job done. Plus how can you not root for this guy??? He signs as a first round draft pick for way less than he should have because he told the truth about a shoulder injury. Makes it to the big leagues and fails tremendously only to drop off the face of the padres organizational earth. Then all of a sudden emerge again, make the team, and become one of our most consistent starters. I really think this guy is just getting better and better.

I finally got to my first game on Sunday against the stros and boy was it amazing! Perfect 70 degree sunny weather, a late afternoon 3:35 start, $25 dollar 9 rows back from 3rd base seats, and 3 great friends, 4 family members, marines, and mat latos to share it with. Can it get much better??? I had seriously forgotten how awesome petco park and downtown san diego are and how great it is to watch a game there. IF you havent gone out there yet DO IT. NO SERIOUSLY GO TO STUBHUB NOW AND GET TICKETS! And yes im talking to you Matty "this week in hate" rogers, fly over so we can hit up  a game! The only complaint was the 10$ beers but at least it was a large, stone pale ale.

I'm not gonna lie, the recent woes of the padres had really gotten me disappointed in baseball and I was not following it or the pads as much as I should. Sorry for my absence guys, but my sunday petco experience has shocked me back into baseball euphoria! After a first month filled with stephen hawking like boring attitude and demeanorm the padres have finally showed up to the 2011 season. I swear there was a different aura as rick james would say it. Right off the bat on sunday the blue collar sweat and blood denorfia ropes a single, followed by a triple to the 410 sign by bartlett. AND THIS WAS THE FIRST INNING, YES I SAID THE FIRST INNING!

I really think things are starting to go the padres way. The middle of the order is getting shit done lead by Ludwick, Hawpe, and Bartletts resurgence. Ludwick has a new life surrounding him and is crushing the ball and playing solid D. Hawpe has been hitting .300 with 16 rbi since mid May. Barlett has raised his avg. into the mid .260's and is playing better D as of late. The starting pitching is also starting to heat up with a dominating performance by stauff tonight, great stuff by Richard last night and 3 solid starts in a row for Latos. With the bullpen, lead by the big kid himself still smacking bitches around, we are looking pretty damn solid! Not only that, but we still have Maybin, Hudson, Hundley and Thatcher coming back in the near future!

With Hawpe being moved back to the outfield I can already hear a new nightly chant................ RIIZZZZZZZZZZZOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! 16 hr's and 63 rbi already, are those Pujol's stats??? I can't wait to crack skulls on those Colorado Rookies tomorrow! Your padres faithful, Patty Ice, over and out!

O, BITTER SWEET TIDES OF BASEBALL

Two games after that rodeo of hate, the Padres are back to being a functional team again. Well, the Astros are the worst team in the National League, and if not for the Twins (...wtf, Twins?) the worst in the bigs. So we are beating (other) bad teams. Which is good and it's an accomplishment, but the big scheme of things, not that impressive. Sort of like this:

On another broadcasting note: Dick Endberg is starting to learn how to handle Mark Grant, mostly by sort of busting his balls which is funny. MudCat told his theory on the perfect situation for them to catch a foul ball during a game -- which involved the perfect pitch and batter -- and Dick responded with a well-timed **yawn**.  I liked that.

Also if you watch Saturday's game, you can see Jerry's Kids contributer Lil' Kevin ducking under the flying bat that went over the visitor's dugout late in the game! Nice seats can't buy you guts I suppose.

Let's snag three out of four from these mother truckin Texans tomorrow, GO PADZ!

 To round the 3rd edition in a night of failblogging-Pads-style (guess I'm covered for This Week In Hate), here is THIS GUY being guilty of betting on the wrong horse. Imagine being this dude, where the highlight of the day is sitting in his living room with a horrendous headset, then going on national interwebs claiming to be an expert in his (fake) field, only to back a dude who turns around and sharts in his cereal (I assume everyone who works from home eats cereal all day). Real though, up until last night it was a great pic, sucks for him/anyone who paid to see last night's 'game'.

Sports broadcasting is blowing in general right now, especially with the 'Mavericks won because the Heat celebrated a 3 pointer too soon and sparked their comeback' story line. That shit's for clicks only, the Mavs won because defense and the BFG (Big F#@&in' German).

STATS

As if the last post didn't have enough negativity, check this out courtesy of ESPN.com:

The Padres are to offense what Haiti was to the Space Race. We are to scoring runs what Michael Jackson is to breathing. We are as good at hitting as Rush Limbaugh is at belly dancing. We score runs with the same regularity as Charlie Sheen takes his meds. Our slugging percentage is about as high as a Jehovah's Witness in Death Valley.

And other hateful things.

DERP

Derp. Derpa derp, de durp derp. Derpa de durp, durp durpa derp. Derp durpa derp derp, durpa derp de derp derp derpa durp. De durpa derp derp derp dupra. Durp. Duuuuurrrrp durp.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, watch the top of the 3rd inning from last night's loss to the Huston Astros. Failtown, USA. Guck this fame.

Here are the low lights, keep in mind these are not all the bad things that happened in this frame, these are the worst parts of the bad things that happened in this inning:

* Leadoff single for 3rd straight inning against Stauffer
* Carlos Lee hit a 3 run bomb but since it's Petco it was a one RBI ground rule double, 3-0 'Stros
* Catcher's interference against the Padres to load the bases
* Bartlett bobbles a ball and runner safe at first, 4-0 at this point
* 2nd baseman Scrub McDerpDerp air mails the final out of the inning on a failed (FAILED) double play attempt, 6-0
* Foul ball, Pads fan in the front row throws bottled beer onto field in true fail fashion during atrocious attempt to snag ball, fitting for the inning
* Hit batsmen

Here is a photo analogy:

Beer strewn, ball out of reach, life questioned. I honestly can't remember an all around worse half inning of baseball. Oh yeah, JV lose 7-4.

WOO ! ! ! !

Four spot winning streak with that 5-4 win over Sweat-your-ass-off-Lanta! That deserves a Rick Flair Woo!

Notes from Tuesday: We are lucky the Braves are, I think, bottom three in runs scored (Dan Uggla's .178 HOLLA!) in May. Matty Latos was shaky, falling behind often, getting peeved at calls, and sweatin all over hisself - aren't Floridians thick skinned? BUT he gave up only 2 runs, Gregorson and Bell each accounting for a run a piece after that, and we'll take the W any way possible. 

The bench seems to get psyched up whenever we score runs and Ludwick has been killin it (he's tied for 8th in the NL in RBIs), we are stealing bases that lead to runs, and we are taking getting key knocks to keep innings alive (save for Senior Creeper Stash during Monday's game with the bases drunk) and we are taking advantage of teams that we need to take advantage of.

But even with the four wins the team, it feels like they are eking by. 7 out of the last 8 games have been won or lost by one run, with 6 of those being Pads wins. We need to take away the errors, and get everyone healthy. I'm looking at you, Hundley.

Lastly, I know that I am probably in the minority, but I love me some Mudcat Grant's "Euge", as in getting that first out was 'euge'. It started in the first few games and they've been jocking it ever since. I giggle each time.

Wait, we can sweep tomorrow... My god. Let's do this -- I want everyone to get into a 1984 state of mind. F them Braves. Let's Gwynn Slam 'Em!

GO PADS. Scalpin time.