Padres End LA Series Up Two on Giants
By Editorial Staff
The Padres pulled out a win in the final game of their series against the Dodgers and got some help from the Braves, who beat Tim Lincecum and the Giants 3-2, doubling the Padres’ NL West lead from one to two games over San Francisco.
Kevin Correia finally kept the ball down, getting ten groundouts in 5 2/3 scoreless innings, and the bullpen slammed the door, shutting out the Dodgers. LA now drops to fourth, eight back of the Padres. Colorado is in third, seven and a half back.
The Padres now commence a six-game stretch against division bottom-dwellers Arizona and Pittsburgh, before a key series with the second-place Giants. The six games before that important matchup are every bit as important as the matchup itself: the Padres need to win big there to establish a cushion before the San Francisco series. As they say, you have to win the games you’re supposed to win.
The series previews for the Arizona series will be up later today. My apologies for not posting a preview to this past LA series, but I was pretty wiped out from all the trade deadline coverage at Call to the Pen, which was probably over 25,000 words in a three-day span. Plus, the series matchups were similar to those from the two teams’ meeting a few days earlier.