Alternating wins and losses across the week, the Dodgers have blown through the leeway they secured with the recent home sweep of the Padres, and it’s back to square one with both teams entering play on Saturday with a 73-56 record. Only a superior H2H record puts the Dodgers ahead of the Padres at the moment.
The man tasked with helping Los Angeles maintain that NL West lead is Tyler Glasnow, who comes into this start with a limited yet rather successful record against the Padres. Glasnow has pitched
particularly well at Petco Park, where the Friars have a .127 AVG against him in his 17 innings of work.
Opposite Glasnow will be one of the many new faces in these San Diego Padres, who, unlike the Dodgers, were quite active during the trade deadline. For the first time since Game 3 of last year’s World Series, Nestor Cortes will take the hill against the Dodgers, still looking to find his footing as a Padre.
In his three starts since joining San Diego’s rotation, Cortes has dealt with overwhelming traffic on the basepaths with a 1.60 WHIP in 15 innings. When you take that into account, his 4.20 ERA is actually quite the accomplishment. It won’t be enough for the Dodgers to simply get people on, but they’ll need to capitalize on those opportunities.
As was evident in Friday’s loss, when Yu Darvish was removed from the game after six one-hit innings with just 74 pitches, San Diego is not shy about making full use of their biggest strength. The Padres have a bullpen with a plethora of shutdown arms readily available to bully even the strongest offenses. A one-run deficit against the likes of Jason Adam, Mason Miller, and Robert Suárez felt significantly bigger, and it ultimately proved too much for the Dodgers to overcome in a 2-1 defeat.
Saturday’s game info
- Teams: Dodgers at Padres
- Ballpark: Petco Park, San Diego
- Start time: 5:40 p.m. PT
- TV: SportsNet LA, MLB Network (out-of-market only)
- Radio: AM 570 (English), KTNQ 1020 AM (Spanish)
