San Diego, CA
Padres Daily: Penned in; going after Ohtani; intentional thinking
Good morning from Los Angeles,
What happened last night was about how it probably had to go for the Dodgers to beat the Padres.
The Dodgers do not have good starting pitching. They have an excellent bullpen and an even better offense.
Their starting pitcher got drilled. Their bullpen did not allow a run. Their offense scored a lot. That was the game.
We will get to some of the decisions made in the Padres’ 7-5 loss in Game 1 of the National League Division Series, because this is the time of year where every move can at least be questioned.
But this was not on manager Mike Shildt.
It was kind of on Dylan Cease, who got just 10 outs and allowed eight baserunners. Well, seven baserunners plus Shohei Ohtani jogging around the bases without stopping after hitting a 97 mph fastball that was not quite high enough to prevent him from hitting a three-run homer.
It was also kind of on the offense that did nothing for most of (and scored nothing for all of) the final six innings.
The Padres have scored one run in 18⅔ innings against relief pitchers this postseason.
“You get into playoff games, you have good bullpens you’re facing,” Shildt said. “That’s part of it. Clearly, we’re capable against any reliever. I thought we had some good at-bats, had some traffic out there. Had the go-ahead run at the plate late in the last inning. And our offense has been good all year. … We got (Yoshinobu) Yamamoto out of there early. Their bullpen came in, did the job. And we just weren’t able to get the big blow.”
Yes, the Braves and Dodgers have some excellent high-leverage relievers. But dating back to the final three weeks of the season, the Padres have endured a number of scoring droughts.
They have gone at least five innings without a run 11 times in their past 19 games. They didn’t score in the final six innings last night and went 11 batters without reaching base between Kyle Higashioka’s one-out double in the fourth and Jurickson Profar’s lead-off walk in the eighth. They were 2-for-11 with runners in scoring position.
That all added up to a wasted opportunity when they had leads of 3-0 and 5-3 against Yamamoto, who was pulled after three innings.
It’s difficult to pin a loss on an offense that scored five runs. Up until last night, the Padres were 67-8 when scoring at least five runs.
The problem is, you have to do what the game demands. And the Padres are facing a team that can hit against pretty much any pitcher. So last night’s game demanded the Padres score more.
“We know they are going to come back and they’re going to score runs,” Manny Machado said.
It was Machado who put the Padres up 3-0 with a two-run homer in the first inning that made 53,028 people about as quiet as such a gathering could be.
But the Padres were going against the Dodgers, who have the best player on earth playing his best and two former MVPs hitting directly behind him and then All-Stars hitting in two of the three spots after that.
“We knew it wasn’t going to be enough,” said Machado, who struck out in the eighth and ninth innings. “We have to continue stringing up good at-bats as a team and keep competing. … We did. We didn’t execute. We didn’t get so many hits off the bullpen. They came in and made their pitches. I think we had some good at-bats, and we just couldn’t get anything rolling until the last two innings.”
What they got going in the eighth inning was the lead-off walk by Profar, a one-out walk by Jackson Merrill and a two-out walk by Jake Cronenworth before Donovan Solano struck out.
What they got going in the ninth was a two-out single by Fernando Tatis Jr. and a walk by Profar before Machado struck out.
“After Yamamoto went out, I feel like they brought guys that just executed pitches,” Tatis said. “They were not afraid of attacking. And yeah, they silenced our bats for most of the game.”
You can read my game story (here) for the breakdown of events, as the Dodgers accomplished their mission of “fighting” in Game 1 plus more quotes from Tatis and Machado and some from Cease.
Going after him
Sure, this is what can happen when you pitch to Ohtani:
OH MY GOODNESS!!
SHOHEI OHTANI HOMERS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN HIS POSTSEASON CAREER!!
📲 Watch in 4K on the FOX Sports App pic.twitter.com/SMgBYSBA8f
— FOX Sports: MLB (@MLBONFOX) October 6, 2024
There is a school of thought that says that at this point you pitch around him in pretty much every crucial situation.
That is not the school in which Shildt is enrolled.
And there was evidence last night to support the Padres manager’s thinking, even if the lasting image is the home Cease allowed when there was a base open.
Ohtani singled against left-hander Adrián Morejón in the fourth inning on a 98 mph fastball that shattered his bat as the ball floated into center field at 67.8 mph.
Cease got Ohtani on a fly ball to start the bottom of the first. Jason Adam struck him out on three pitches to start the sixth. And Scott finished a strikeout of Ohtani on a 97 mph fastball above the zone with a runner on second and one down in the eighth.
Tanner Scott’s 2Ks in the 8th. pic.twitter.com/35XOmjRzsD
— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) October 6, 2024
“He’s a good player,” Shildt said. “Clearly, he’s done some pretty special things this year. I feel good about — it’s just about execution. You’ve got to be even finer against really good players. But we have really good players, too. It’s just about the execution. … Morejón absolutely made a beautiful pitch and blew him up. And he got one into center field. I like Scott’s pitches against him, like Adam’s pitches against him. We executed. We were able to get him out. We just got something that was out over (from Cease) that he was able to get the meat of the bat on.”
All that said, Ohtani is 8-for-16 in his past four games against the Padres (over the past 12 days) and is batting .461 with a 1.439 OPS in 85 plate appearances since Sept. 11. In that span, he is batting .630 with a 2.100 OPS in 29 plate appearances with runners in scoring position.
Intentional reasoning
The player Shildt did notably avoid once was Mookie Betts, eschewing a 2-2 count and issuing an intentional walk to the Dodgers’ No.2 batter in the fourth inning.
The decision came after Morejón, who had entered the game to face Ohtani, yielded the broken-bat single to load the bases and then had a splitter get past Higashioka for a wild pitch that scored the lead runner and moved the other two runners up a base.
So with first base open, Shildt gave the free pass to the right-handed-hitting Betts to load the bases and bring up left-handed-hitting Freddie Freeman.
“I was surprised,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “I think Mookie was, too. Morejón just threw a ball in the dirt to give up a run. I don’t know if Mike was kind of leery of another wild pitch. Obviously, with two strikes, it typically doesn’t happen, and they wanted to take their chance with Freddie, which is one of those things, when you have good players, I think we’re in a good spot if it’s Mookie or Freddie. But I guess they just wanted that left-handed match-up.”
Yes. And there was more.
Shildt considered that Betts put the ball on the ground just 23.5% of the time against lefties this season and struck out just 8% of the time against lefties and walked 14% of the time he reached a 2-2 count against lefties.
“So now you can sit there and say, let’s tap dance around him,” Shildt said of his options. “No, let’s go to Freddie with Morejon, who throws 50 percent ground-ball rating against lefties. … So we go to Freddie to get the (grounder). And we got it.”
Freeman hit the first pitch he saw to the right side. Solano, playing first base, had to run to his right to field it and make a throw across his body to force out the runner at home for the second out.
With that, Shildt went to right-hander Jeremiah Estrada to face right-handed hitting Teoscar Hernández.
That did not go as planned, which does on its own did not make Shildt’s strategy wrong. Estrada simply threw a 98 mph fastball to the heart of the zone that Hernández lined to right-center field to drive in two runs and give the Dodgers their first lead of the night, at 6-5.
“We’ve got Estrada, who we like a lot,” Shildt said. “And we like a righty on Hernandez. And to his credit, put a swing and brought in two runs.”
One way or another
The throw Solano made after fielding Freeman’s soft grounder to get the out at home in the fourth inning was excellent.
The decision was at least debatable, in that it appeared he might have been able to get an inning-ending double play.
What a play by Donovan Solano to keep the run off of the board for the Padres! pic.twitter.com/g94FUlzwHy
— FOX Sports: MLB (@MLBONFOX) October 6, 2024
Shildt believed the right play was to take out the run.
“I think when in doubt he made the right play,” Shildt said. “It was a tough play. But I don’t know (that) it’s an easy double play ball. It’s not hit hard. It’s going away. We’ve got a pitcher who has got to come over. I thought he made a good play. He’s making a baseball play to try to cut a run down, which he did. He’s smart. He knows we’ve got a guy coming in for the next guy. Made a good baseball play to keep it right there.”
Bounceback opportunity
The Padres have the experience of having won the 2022 NLDS in four games after dropping Game 1 to the Dodgers.
“It’s a different year,” Machado said.
Just three pitchers and three position players on the Padres’ roster for this series were on the ’22 Division Series roster.
So, the Padres chose to draw, instead, on what they have done this season.
Among their more resilient traits was that they lost consecutive games just four times in their final 65 games. (One of those times was last week against the Dodgers.)
Said Jake Cronenworth: “This team has done it all year — the ability to bounce back the next day after a tough loss and forget about what happened the day before.”
Xander Bogaerts, who has two World Series rings and last night played in his 48th postseason game, most on the Padres, talked about this last week.
“I feel like the bounce back ability is the best thing we might have,” he said. “You have some tough losses, it’s easy to come in the next day and be like, ‘(Expletive). I still remember that. That sucked.’ But the ability we have to turn the page real quick and come in the next day knowing we gotta go at it again and go about it the right way … you gotta have that, because when it comes to the playoffs, you’re not going to win every game.”
The Padres face Jack Flaherty tonight.
The Dodgers moved Flaherty back a day, in part to facilitate his work cleaning up some mechanical issues in the bullpen.
Flaherty allowed the Padres three runs in five innings on Sept. 25 and has allowed at least three runs in three straight starts.
Yu Darvish, who has a 3.55 ERA in five starts (25⅓ innings) since returning from an absence of more than three months while dealing with elbow soreness and a personal matter, starts for the Padres. (He was the winner in Game 2 two years ago, allowing three runs in five innings in the 5-3 victory.)
With an off day tomorrow, it would seem every reliever on both teams will be available today except perhaps Blake Treinen. He threw 39 pitches in 1⅔ innings to close out last night’s game. It was the most outs Treinen recorded in a game since 2021 and tied for his most pitches in a game since 2019.
You can read in Jeff Sanders’ notebook from yesterday (here) about Darvish’s relationship with Ohtani and the Padres’ pitching plans for later in the series. (Also — and I don’t know where he gets off — but Sanders had a couple tidbits in that notebook about Machado’s standing on the franchise’s all-time postseason list and a hard hit by Tatis.)
Kim changes rep
Even facing surgery to repair a tear in the labrum of his right shoulder and after a down offensive season, Ha-Seong Kim figures to be coveted for his defense in the middle of the infield and is expected to command more than the $8 million he would be due if he stayed with the Padres.
So there was not much question as to whether Kim would decline the option on his contract after this season.
And he sent a clear signal as to what direction he will choose by recently hiring the Boras Corporation to represent him. One does not hire Scott Boras at a time like this with the intention of remaining in an existing contract.
The 28-year-old Kim, who hit .233/.330/.370 in 120 games this season, has made $28 million in his four seasons since joining the Padres. The mutual option on his contract would pay him $8 million next season if both sides decided to exercise their option. The Padres will owe Kim $2 million if he opts out.
Tidbits
- Tatis was 2-for-4 with a walk last night and is 6-for-10 with three walks in three postseason games. One thing almost always coincides with Tatis going on a tear offensively: excellent plate discipline. Tatis has chased just four of the 29 pitches (13.7%) he has seen outside the strike zone the past three games. That is less than half his chase rate in the regular season.
- After going 0-for-7 in the wild-card series, Bogaerts was 2-for-4 with a two-run double last night.
- Higashioka caught Dylan Cease last night for the first time since July 2. While the Padres have pretty strictly matched up their pitchers with the same catchers, the fact Higashioka entered yesterday having homered in three of his previous six at-bats won out. Said Shildt: “I’m no genius, but we’ll stick with that guy.” Higashioka was 1-for-2 with a double last night.
- Profar walked twice last night, drove in a run with a groundout and finished 0-for-3. He is 1-for-10 this postseason.
- The Padres’ 6 through 9 batters are 6-for-38 (.158) in the postseason. Three of the hits are by Higashioka and two are by Bogaerts. Donovan Solano, who has started all three games, including the two against right-handers, is 1-for-11. Jake Cronenworth is 0-for-9 with a walk, and he has been hit by a pitch.
- Jackson Merrill worked a seven-pitch walk and a 10-pitch walk last night. He was 0-for-2 and scored a run and is 3-for-9 in the three postseason games.
- If you missed the coverage from Friday, I wrote Friday (here) about Joe Musgrove needing Tommy John surgery. And Bryce Miller wrote a column (here) after talking with Sheel Seidler.
All right, that’s it for me.
Talk to you tomorrow.
San Diego, CA
Automated license plate readers and public surveillance cameras are coming to Imperial Beach
The city of Imperial Beach will soon install four Automated License Plate Readers and two additional “public safety cameras” in hopes of improving public safety.
On June 3, Imperial Beach city councilmembers voted to enter into an agreement with the San Diego Sheriff’s Office to place four license plate readers manufactured by surveillance giant Flock Safety at four proposed intersections, and they will also install two cameras in the city to monitor for criminal behavior.
The cameras, part of a two-month pilot program, seek to improve public safety in the South Bay coastal town.
The four proposed locations for the license plate cameras are Imperial Beach Boulevard and 13th Street, Palm Avenue and 13th Street, 13th Street and Elm and 9th Street and Elm Ave.
The proposed locations for the public cameras are on the median of Palm Avenue and 8th Street, Palm Avenue and Seacoast Drive and Imperial Beach Boulevard and Seacoast Drive.
For the license plate readers, city staff said they have proven their usefulness in cities and unincorporated areas throughout San Diego County for years.
“[License Plate Reader] technology has contributed to multiple arrests, including identifying suspects’ vehicles involved in retail thefts, gas station thefts, and vehicle burglaries. [License Plate Readers] have also assisted in identifying a suspect vehicle in an international hit-and-run homicide in Lemon Grove and a vehicle involved in a [pellet] gun case in Encinitas,” reads the city’s staff report to the city council.
City staff said the Sheriff’s Office recommends a total of eight license plate readers, but the city opted for four.
“This is a pilot program. We have to consider the trade-off of privacy for security,” said public speaker Vivian Dunbar. “People have been falsely arrested and falsely identified through the use of these cameras.”
Imperial Beach Mayor Pro-Tem Jack Fisher said that while he understands the privacy concerns, the benefits outweigh any negatives. “This is one of those programs where IB is not leading the charge. A few weeks back, everyone was aware of the tragedy that happened at the Islamic Center of San Diego and the license plate readers were key in tracking those individuals down. It’s good for us to do our part.”
Added Fisher, “The era of big brother has passed, if you have a cell phone, you know there is already tracking.”
The council unanimously voted in favor of the pilot program.
Utility man Samad Taylor was selected to the Major League roster from Triple-A El Paso in a corresponding move.
Tuesday night was a tale of two parties. Two election night parties.
At Liberty Station’s Stone Brewing, a small coterie of Democratic elected officials and functionaries and a larger coterie of news media shuffled around trying to make sense of the lackluster returns trickling in.
Meanwhile, at downtown’s US Grant Hotel, a much more spirited collection of Republican operatives and supporters laughed and drank in a blindingly-lit convention room, backed by a pianist’s rendition of “Billie Jean.”
The takeaway seemed clear: this was a not-so-great night for San Diego’s Democratic in-group. Chula Vista’s Republican mayor had a huge lead over his Democratic opponent. A tax on second homes lagged behind in the vote count. And several Republicans seemed to make it out of crowded primary fields in local races.
Hell, even if it was only a just-OK night for Republicans – that still seemed worth celebrating to them.
Normally we now get long stretches of days, even weeks of fingernail-biting anticipation as the county so slowly tallies the rest of the votes. But there doesn’t appear to be many close races to watch this time around. There are a couple. We start at the top:
It’s Becerra vs. Hilton
As of 11 p.m., with more than 50 percent of votes counted, it appeared that a Republican and Democrat — rather than two Democrats — would make it through to the general election. Steve Hilton and Xavier Becerra led the race, with billionaire Tom Steyer on the outside looking in. The New York Times has a nice tracker here.
Empty Homes Tax Goes Down
Measure A presented a simple choice. What do voters in the city of San Diego have more disdain for – people with enough money to own a second home they leave empty, or new taxes? Turns out, it’s additional taxes. For now, at least.
Championed by Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera, Measure A would have placed a tax on homes left vacant for more than half of the year. It was pitched as a way to both raise badly needed revenue for the city and, potentially, make available badly-needed housing.
As of Tuesday evening, the measure’s prospects looked grim, with about 58 percent of voters casting a ‘No’ vote. It will become the second citywide tax increase rejected by voters in as many years. Despite the poor showing, intern Naomi Granata found the pitch resonated with some voters in North Park.
San Diego County Assessor-Recorder-Clerk Jordan Marks was one of a number of local electeds who came out in opposition of the tax. He said the city’s housing problems couldn’t be solved by what he called “bad taxes.”
“This result reflects that Sean Elo-Rivera and the City Council have lost the trust of the public and that voters are reading the fine print,” Marks said.
Elo-Rivera said it wasn’t looking good, but he was hopeful the picture would improve. Ultimately, he thought the money spent opposing the tax — and the distorted message he felt it sent — was too big to overcome.
“There was an enormous amount of money spent, and not just money spent, but money spent to trick voters into thinking that something was going to impact them that wasn’t,” Elo-Rivera said.
No Ammar
Republican County Supervisor Jim Desmond led the way in the 48th Congressional District on Tuesday night.
What we were waiting for is the candidate who would go with him to the runoff. It will attract a ton of national attention and money. It was one of the seats made more competitive by Democrats in the special redistricting vote last year.
San Diego City Councilmember Marni von Wilpert and Ammar Campa-Najjar, squared off for a chance to wrest the seat out of longtime Republican control. With 53 percent reporting, von Wilpert held a commanding lead over Campa-Najjar. The councilmember will advance to face Desmond in November.
On the ground in the district, reporter Tigist Layne found that the national politics that led to the redistricting fight were also front and center on voters’ minds as they headed into vote.
Bailey vs. Crosby in Coastal Council District
Former Coronado Mayor Richard Bailey and Deputy City Attorney Nicole Crosby will advance to the November election in District 2 of the San Diego City Council.
Bailey, a Republican-turned-Independent, seemed destined to finish in the top two after he attracted significant attention on social media. The race for the second spot was more uncertain. Josh Coyne, like Crosby, attracted significant Democratic support. And Mandy Havlik — a more development-resistant candidate — also had strong grassroots support in Point Loma.
Our new intern Fiona Bork talked to voters in District 2, which covers the city’s southern coastline, who said that affordability was the most important issue. Exactly how that explained their electoral choices differed by a lot. One voter said Coyne’s market-driven approach to building more housing appealed to him. Another liked Havlik’s approach to limiting vacation rentals. A third voted for Bailey because she wanted less development and more public transit. It seems unlikely that Bailey, who is fiscally conservative, would support massively expanding public transit options. Read the full story here.
City Council District 4: The race for southeastern San Diego’s council district featured three candidates: incumbent Henry Foster, Martha Abraham and Johnny Lee Dang.
Abraham was highly critical of Foster in her campaign and that seemed to resonate well with voters. At the latest count, she led Foster by several hundred votes.
Foster has many supporters in the district, but the city’s handling of catastrophic flooding in January 2024 — among other issues — has led to massive distrust of City Hall.
Council District 6: Incumbent Kent Lee had one prominent opponent, Mark Powell, who is a former member of the County Board of Education. They will both make the runoff but Lee got 55 percent of the vote in early counting.
City Council District 8: San Ysidro School Board Member Antonio Martinez and current District 8 chief of staff, Gerardo Ramirez, lead in this race — which was crowded with Democrats. Venus Molina, who serves as the chief of staff to Councilmember Jennifer Campbell, trailed closely behind in third place. This is one of the races close enough to change as the registrar continues counting votes. Molina’s count improved slightly as the night went on.
Our South County reporter, Jim Hinch, spoke with voters outside the Otay Mesa/Nestor Branch Library. One voter told Hinch she voted for Molina because she liked that she is local and a single mother. Read the full story here.
Election Watch Party Bonus: Ramirez’ supporters and family gathered at the Landing Strip, a bar and restaurant at Brown Field Municipal Airport, to watch results roll in. They broke out into applause when results showed him coming in second.
“For some of the folks it might seem like ‘hey man’ you’re second place, but we’re in there. This is a huge, wonderful sign,” said Ramirez.
DeMaio’s Gonna Gloat
Two local elections were something of a proxy battle between two warring factions of the Republican Party. Assemblymember Carl DeMaio’s team won, again. Every time local Republican leaders unite to oppose him or the people he supports, DeMaio wins. This time it was about two races: the one to replace County Supervisor Jim Desmond and the one to replace State Sen. Brian Jones.
In the county supervisor race: San Marcos Mayor Rebecca Jones left no doubt she would make it to the runoff. The only remaining question is who will face her — Vista Mayor John Franklin or Kyle Krahel, the former chair of the Democratic Party. After the first votes were counted, Krahel held a slight advantage with 20 percent of the vote compared to Franklin’s 19 percent. DeMaio went all in for Jones and she led the field with more than 41 percent of the vote.
In the state Senate race: As expected, former San Diego City Attorney Mara Elliott made the runoff for the state Senate District 40 seat. She got nearly 45 percent of the votes counted so far. The real question was who would go with her. That Republican battle between Kristie Bruce-Lane and San Marcos City Councilmember Ed Musgrove seems to have also gone DeMaio’s way with Bruce-Lane holding a 4.7-percentage-point advantage over Musgrove.
That’s not enough of a gap to call the race but it’s significant.
Teachers Union Pushed Barrera to Runoff in Statewide Race
The race for State Superintendent of Public Instruction became something of a flex test for the state’s largest teachers union. Could the California Teachers Association almost singlehandedly lift a relatively unknown San Diego board member over a bevvy of better financed, higher profile candidates? Yup. Easily.
Fueled by nearly $5 million in spending from the state’s largest teachers union, longtime San Diego Unified Trustee and labor-darling Richard Barrera sailed to a convincing second place finish in the race for state supe. In his nearly two decades as the power behind the throne of the second largest district in the state, Barrera has engineered a progressive labor friendly transformation that the union hopes can be taken statewide.
He will now face off against Republican Chino Valley Trustee Sonja Shaw in November.
Brews and News + Your Chance to Win Padres Tickets
Meet our team and get an election debrief at our Brews & News Live Podcast at Soda Bar on Thursday, June 11. We will be joined by San Diego City Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera. Get your tickets here and you’ll be automatically entered to win two tickets to a Padres game. Winners will be announced at the event.
Obligatory note: No purchase or payment of any kind is necessary to enter or win the Brews and News Live Podcast Giveaway. A ticket purchase or donation will not increase chances of winning. All applicable federal, state, local and municipal laws, rules, and regulations apply. Void where prohibited by law.
In Other News
- Opinion: A retired lifeguard finds irony in SDG&E’s stance on residents putting solar panels on their balconies. The company once argued against rooftop solar because it was unfair to renters, but now, he writes, “a low-cost system allows most of those same people access to solar, but SDG&E seeks to deny them as well.” (ICYMI: Our MacKenzie Elmer wrote that plugging in such a device could put her at risk of getting her power cut.)
- San Diego County officials warned South Bay residents to limit their exposure to the outdoors after a broken pipe spilled millions of gallons of sewage into the Tijuana River. (Union-Tribune)
- NBC 7 reports that a judge ruled that the city of San Diego illegally collected parking ticket late fees for three years.
- About that cross-border tunnel: The U.S. Attorney’s office says a recently discovered, massive tunnel stretching from Tijuana to Otay Mesa leads to a fake store in the southern San Diego neighborhood. Four people have been charged in connection with drug trafficking linked to the tunnel.
The Morning Report was written by Jakob McWhinney, Mariana Martínez Barba and Will Huntsberry. It was edited by Will Huntsberry, Andrea Sanchez-Villafaña and Scott Lewis.
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