Padres Destroyed By Diamondbacks & Delgado in 10-0 Shutout Loss

Stults allowed seven runs against Arizona tonight. Mandatory Credit: Matt Kartozian-USA TODAY Sports

On June 14, 2013, Eric Stults threw a two-hit complete game gem for the Friars against the Diamondbacks at Petco Park.  Stults mixed his pitches well, hit his locations, and pitched to contact to almost perfection as Arizona’s hitters were unable to make solid contact on anything he threw that evening.  Sadly for San Diego, Arizona’s hitters learned from their mistakes and absolutely crushed the left hander’s mistakes tonight in a 10-0 rout at Chase Field.

Stults allowed two runs in the first inning, two more in the second, two more in the third, and another one in the bottom of the fourth!  To their credit though, Arizona’s lineup absolutely pounced on Stults.  Aaron Hill hit two run-scoring doubles, Cliff Pennington had one of his own, and Wil Nieves and Martin Prado each had run scoring singles to boot.

All of that happened I might add over the game’s first three innings, and I did not even count the botched throws on a sacrifice bunt which scored another run for Arizona.  Then when Cody Ross plated a run in the bottom of the fourth with another single, the Diamondbacks moved ahead 7-0!

Overall, Stults gave up 11 hits in addition to his seven runs over his five innings of work and took the loss.  Arizona tacked on another tree runs during the final four innings for good measure, but the game was basically over after the first inning of play with the way that San Diego’s lineup collectively failed to perform tonight.

After Everth Cabrera led the game off with a single, only two Padres recorded a hit over the course of the entire game (Chase Headley and Chris Denorfia).  They were so inept at the plate that they made Randall Delgado look like a Cy Young Award winner.  In fact, the hardest hit ball of the night by a San Diego player happened to be an out after Gerardo Parra made a spectacular home run-saving grab on a ball smashed to right field by Will Venable.

To be fair to Delgado though, he did do a tremendous job.  He forced San Diego’s hitters to swing at pitches out of the strike zone, and he turned their aggressiveness into a double-edged sword because the right-hander kept his pitch count low all night.  Delgado even had two hits and scored a run during his complete game shutout, and probably enjoyed the game of his professional career at the Padres’ expense.

Final Thoughts

Andrew Cashner will take the hill for the Friars tomorrow as they will look to rebound from this awful loss.  Cashner worked through some early-game trouble against Milwaukee on Monday night and earned a victory, so hopefully he will be able to build off of his last performance.  Then again, it would be nice if the Friars’ lineup could give him some run support.  Something which they failed to do tonight for Stults.

Follow me on Twitter: @DominicDiTolla

Like “Chicken Friars” on Facebook: Chicken Friars