How Do You Know It Is Time To Give Up?

It is the first game of the "second half," following the All Star break, and your team is playing the first of an 11 game road trip. Your ace is on the hill and you score one in the first and one in the third. Things are looking up.

Next thing you know it is the top of the ninth and they are down 4-2. Fortunately the other team's biggest weakness is their bullpen, so there is still a shot. Your second year third baseman rips a double to lead off the inning, and up comes the pride of the farm system. The rookie crushes a ball opposite field off of the wall, jogging into second to represent the tying run.

Then your sometimes power hitting shortstop gets pulled for a pinch hitter by the name of Brandon Myrow...there is your first sign things are not looking good for this team. He strikes out, swinging at a 3-2 pitch that bounces before the plate. Next up...Nick Hundley. Not Todd Hundley(who doesn't exactly give the last name power), but Nick Hundley. At least he advances the runner with his slow roller to second.

Now the tying run is just 90 feet away, and the closer is a little shaken, but there are two outs. We are obviously getting to the bottom of the lineup, so we should probably throw in our pinch hitter here. The problem is we just traded him for...I don't know what, the end of paying his salary?

So your pinch hitter in the ninth inning, with two outs and the tying run on first? Luis Rodriguez!!

Thank you Bud, Sandy, and Kevin, you made it much easier for me to give up. Now lets move on. We can look forward to the future with lots of Dominican players filling in around a great core...Kooz, Adrian, Edgar (I never thought I would say that about him), Chase (freaking beast), Jake, CY (if he ever recovers), and Heath. There are 7 really solid, young guys that give us something to build on. Let's sell the rest and move on.

Sorry Khalil.

Peavy Drowns His Sorrows with Jager

Jake Peavy got his first loss of the year yesterday after giving up only 2 runs over 7 innings. I don't know what more you can expect from your starter, but the Padres need more. They didn't even manage to get him a win in his 8 innings of shutout ball in the infamous 22 inning game where the Pads managed only 1 run.

Though Jake Peavy is on pace for a second straight CY Young, he may not get there unless he can get some run support. It looks like things may be getting to him as he has started drinking away the losses that keep mounting.

Ok, this isn't really after the game, but if I was him I would be doing this after just about every start. Only two teams in all of baseball have a worse record, and only the Giants in the NL are even close to the Padres in runs scored (both tied at 84).

Coed Magazine found and posted these pictures, so thanks to them...maybe someone out there knows where they are from.

Maybe the rest of the team needs to relax with some Jager and Jake to have his success rub off on them. Not only does Jake lead all Padre starters in ERA, but he is second in batting average (.308) behind fellow starter Justin Germano (.400-Adrian leads the rest of the team at .280) Maybe we should send a few cases of Jager to the clubhouse.

A drunk Jake Peavy is probably better than most guys sober.

Did Peavy Cheat on Saturday Night?

There has been a buzz about Jake Peavy using Pine Tar or some other substance on the ball Saturday night during his complete game dominance of the LA Dodgers. The picture below shows that he did have dirty fingers, but that is about it. The chances of it being pine tar or just dirt, sweat and rosin are probably about equal, and to me, it doesn't matter which.

Joe Torre did not want to broach the subject after the game saying he didn't “want to make excuses for not winning. I didn’t suspect anything (Saturday). It was the first time I’ve seen him pitch.” The Frequent Friar points out that not only has Torre seen Peavy pitch, but his Yankees saw Peavy throw 7 innings and giving up only 1 run on three hits in his Major League Debut.

First of all, this was only the first week of the season, and due to this picture surfacing, they will be paying close attention to his hands in future games, meaning it will not be an issue in the future. So if people want to complain about the Dodgers getting screwed out of one win in April, thats fine. Secondly, it is not like Jake has been struggling and needed a little help to get back on his game.

The man won the CY Young last year in what was hardly a race for the award, and in his first start of the year he went 7 innings giving up only three hits and 0 runs. Sure, you can argue he could have cheated in that game too, but what has this guy ever done to make people think he would be a cheater?

This reminds me of the Ladanian Tomlinson hysteria when he was unable to play in the AFC Championship game. Everyone doubted the seriousness of his injury and the seriousness of his desire to play and win. The problem is that he has made a whole career of playing hard, fast and every week. Why don't people look at a person's character in the past when things like this come up?

If you look back at Jake's career thus far, just like Tomlinson's, there is nothing there to lead you to believe that he is the kind of guy that cheats. So why can't we all just give him the benefit of the doubt and move on. He won't be able to do it now that he will be under the spotlight, so lets let his pitching do the talking for the rest of the year, as he works towards a second straight CY Young.

The story was first broken by The Big Lead.

Peavy and Oswalt Injured Following Opening Day Game

It was reported that Roy Oswalt would be staying with Jake Peavy during the Padres vs Astros Opening week series, and what sounded like a harmless idea turned ugly after the Padres 4-0 win, when the two got drunk and ended up fighting at Peavy's home.

Apparently upon returning from the game in which Jake Peavy outpitched (and outhit) Roy Oswalt, the two decided to throw back a few drinks. Peavy's wife reported that it started out with Jake giving Roy a hard time over getting two RBI's off of the Astros pitcher but took a turn for the worse.

"Jake was giving Roy a little bit of a hard time for losing, and Roy seemed a little upset. After about an hour, Roy brought it up again and this time he was much more angry."

The argument eventually turned into a short but dangerous fight when Oswalt started swinging at Peavy. Both ended up with injured hands, but Peavy seems to have suffered the worst when he heard a crack in his wrist upon landing a bunch to the back of Oswalt's head.

There is no news yet as to the seriousness of each injury, but due to Peavy's history throughout high school of wrist injuries, things look disappointing for a repeat of his Cy Young.

More news to come shortly.

Oh yeah, and none of that is true...April Fools...hope it gave you a short scare only.

Peavy Announces Plan To Run for 2008 Cy Young

It looked on paper to be a great pitching duel to open up the 2008 season, but turned into a one sided affair. While Roy Oswalt struggled to get through his first start finishing only 5.1 innings which did not include a single 1-2-3 inning. Meanwhile, Jake flew through the Astros lineup, conceding only three hits over 7 innings and no runs, starting off 2008 just like last year, with the second consecutive opening day shutout.

The Padres managed 11 hits off of Oswalt which ties a career high. Oswalt has finished in the top five of Cy Young voting 5 times, seeming to be a candidate for the award every year. "I didn't really have a whole lot tonight," Oswalt said. "I didn't have any breaking pitches. Pretty much had to pitch my fastball the whole night."

Tadahito Iguchi started off his Padres career on the right foot, going 3 for 5 with 2 doubles and a run scored. Paul McAnulty took advantage of the start in left going 2 for 3 with a walk. I didn't give the guy much credit coming into the year, but he got things started the right way.

Apparently Jake and Roy have been friends ever since meeting on the 2005 All Star team, to the point where Roy is actually staying at the Peavy household during this season opening series. Jake didn't show his friendship well, by not only beating the Astros on the mound, but getting an RBI single, and RBI sacrafice fly, and a walk in his three at bats vs his good buddy.

When asked if he would rub it in, Jake said, "I don't know if I'll go hard at it tonight because I know how it feels to be on the losing end of a big league ballgame. Nobody's happy, but maybe the next few days I may throw some comments out there, and I promise you, in November or December he's not going to forget about it."

Peavy has won all three of his Opening Day starts, with a 0.45 ERA. He allowed six baserunners Monday night, none of whom advanced past second base. Heath Bell and Cla Meredith did what Padres bullpens have come to be known for and that is finish a combined shutout.

The Padres started out the season with 14 hits and a shutout win, which is about all you can ask for. Me, I hate to see so many base runners and only four runs, but I won't start complaining yet. The Padres will need more than pitching to win an extremely competitive NL West, and at least they showed they can get hits off of one of the best pitchers in the game. For now that will do. Nice work!

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