SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA – MAY 11: Will Smith #16, Max Muncy #13 and Shohei Ohtani #17 congratulate Teoscar Hernández #37 of the Los Angeles Dodgers after his grandslam during the sixth inning of a game against the San Diego Padres at Petco Park on May 11, 2024 in San Diego, California. (Photo by Sean M. Haffey/Getty Images)
On Saturday night, with a chance to win a series from the Dodgers, the Padres did not hit or pitch very well. That's usually not a good way to beat a very good baseball team.
The Padres hitters never had a runner advance past 2nd base while their pitchers issued six walks and let three of them score in a 5-0 loss to LA, not exactly the way they wanted to perform in front of 46,701 people, the largest single-game crowd in Petco Park history.
Matt Waldron got the start and the man with the knuckleball was actually not too bad. He gave up a solo home run to Freddie Freeman in the 1st but then settled down and struck out six in 5.1 innings. His night ended when he walked Shohei Ohtani in the 6th. In came Adrian Morejon, who has the tendency to be either incredible or awful. This time was the latter.
Morejon got Freeman to fly out then issued walks to Will Smith and Max Muncy to load the bases. Manager Mike Shildt brought in Enyel De Los Santos to face Teoscar Hernandez, hoping the right-on-right matchup would go in San Diego's favor. It did not. De Los Santos hung a slider and Hernandez launched a grand slam into the left field seats to make it 5-0 Dodgers and that was that.
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The Friars can still take the weekend series on Sunday afternoon when Yu Darvish gets the ball against Walker Buehler.
