In case you have not seen or heard or otherwise been aware of us making this point in the past I’ll bring it up again:
When things go badly for the Padres they do so in a truly spectacular fashion.
In just one inning on Saturday afternoon at Petco Park the Padres went from leading by two runs … to trailing by seven runs and eventually losing 12-6 to the Royals.
The bit of good news is the Padres got another nice game from Jose Pirela. Starting at 1st base to give Wil Myers a day off, the recent El Paso recall was batting leadoff and opened the game with a home run against former Padre starter Ian Kennedy. Pirela had three hits and drove in three runs and it hitting .500 since re-joining the big league club.
2nd baseman Yangervis Solarte also had a nice afternoon. Solarte had a pair of RBI singles, the second one coming in the 7th inning to put the Friars on top 5-3. After that the Padres collapsed like a giraffe on a sheet of ice.
We knew the bullpen was going to be taxed because Miguel Diaz was asked to make his first MLB start in place of the injured Jarred Cosart. The rookie Rule 5 draftee made it through the first two innings unscathed but ran in to trouble in the third when he loaded the bases on a single and two walks, one of them to Kennedy.
Craig Stammen came in and, for the second time in a week, got out of a bases loaded, no outs jam that he inherited. Stammen struck out Jorge Bonifacio then got Lorenzo Cain to ground in to an inning-ending double play to pull the Houdini act. Stammen ended up going 3.0 innings, allowing one run.
Jose Torres and Kirby Yates followed with abbreviated appearances, both allowing one run, so in the top of the 8th inning San Diego had a 5-3 lead with the right man on the mound.
Brad Hand has been one of the best relievers in the game in 2017 and is squarely in the All-Star Game conversation. He had allowed exactly two home runs for the entire season before Saturday. He gave up back-to-back homers to Eric Hosmer and Salvador Perez and in the baseball blink of an eye the Royals had a 6-5 lead. But they did not stop scoring there.
The recently recalled Jose Valdez coughed up a grand slam to Cain, who hit a pair of dingers, to cap a 9-run Royals 8th inning. The Padres can still take the series from Kansas City on Sunday if rookie Dinelson Lamet can beat rookie Jake Junis.
