Are My Padres Doomed? 120 Game Report

The signs are not good for My favorite baseball team. Things looked so bright and hopeful at the All-Star break - they were 48 and 40, and in first place. The hope was that they would continue at that winning rate and eventually be something like 87 and 75, and win the NL West and go into the playoffs.

The last 10 games have been disastrous - they won 3 and lost 7, and fell out of first place, and are now 3 games behind the dreaded Dodgers. The scores, opponent and starting pitchers for the last 10 games:

3-2 (10) Wash Peavy started
2-3 at NY Williams started and lost
3-4 at NY Hensley started and lost
3-7 at NY Young started
2-4 at Hous Park started and lost
6-3 at Hous Peavy started and won, Trevor saved
7-2 at Hous Williams started
0-1 SF Hensley started and lost
2-3 SF Young started and lost
5-7 (13) SF Park started

The Padres scored 33 runs and gave up 36 in this 10 game block - the offense faltered and the pitching was good enough to win 7 or 8 games, but we only won 3. One problem is defense - Todd Walker has 5 errors in 21 chances at third, and cost at least two games in this block. Gonzalez, Greene, Barfield and Bard are slumping now.

After 120 games, the Padres are 60 and 60, 28 and 34 at home, 32 and 26 on the road. The team is batting 0.263, (opponents are 0.254), have 125 HRs (opponents 136), scored 534 runs (opponents 532), and a 4.11 ERA (opponents 4.14).

What this team needs is to tighten up the defense and better situational hitting. They need to keep Bellhorn at 3rd base, or find a 3B man who can hit in a waiver deal. The starters have done pretty well, but the relievers (especially Linebrink, Brocail and Williamson) continue to falter. Frustrating! Woe!

The obvious conclusion is that this is a 0.500 team, and unless something changes drastically they won't go to the playoffs. I said earlier that an 87 win season would make the playoffs. To achieve that, the Pads have to win 27 and lose 15 in the rest of the season. Is that possible? Sure. Is it likely? Probably not.

What do you think? Probably that I'm wasting my time blogging about this, eh?