The Padres offense has been struggling to score runs for most of 2022, and especially the last two weeks. Nobody, possibly not even in the San Diego clubhouse, was probably predicting their bats would get going against Milwaukee ace Corbin Burnes, the reigning National League Cy Young Award winner.
Baseball is a funny game.
San Diego went bonkers against Burnes, knocking him out in the 4th inning, in a 7-0 win over the Brewers that nearly saw Joe Musgrove throw his 2nd career no-hitter.
Luke Voit brought home the first run of the night with a ground rule double to left field off Burnes in the 1st inning that brought in Manny Machado to make it 1-0 Padres. One inning later Jurickson Profar singled in Trent Grisham to make it 2-0, but the big blow came in the 4th.
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Austin Nola walked and Profar singled again. With two outs Machado put together a tremendous at-bat. Manny fouled off a couple of tough pitches on the outside corner, waiting for Burnes to make a mistake, and when it happened the MVP candidate did not miss. Machado lofted a 3-run home run over the left field wall to make it 5-0.
Burnes was pulled after giving up five earned runs in 3.2 innings. Keep in mind, the Brewers righty gave up five earned runs in April.
Give Joe Musgrove that kind of cushion and you're just about guaranteed a win. The San Diego native was, in a word, dominant, even while battling a bit of a control issue. Musgrove walked three and hit one batter, but struck out six and still had a no-hitter with two outs in the 8th inning. With his pitch count climbing well above 100, manager Bob Melvin was saved a difficult decision when Kolten Wong doubled to deep right field to break up the no-no bid.
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Musgrove, though, stayed in the game to get the final out of the 8th. He finished with 114 pitches and dropped his season ERA to a miniscule 1.64, tops in the National League.
The Padres snap their 4-game losing streak and can earn at least a series split on Saturday afternoon when MacKenzie Gore gets the start against Aaron Ashby.
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