San Diego Padres news: Doubleheader in Philly, Robert Suarez Day is upon us, more

Welcome to Saturday, San Diego Padres fans! Your Padres play a scheduled double-header today in Philadelphia against the Phillies and will hope to keep the momentum from Friday night's 8-3 win going.

San Diego Padres blueprint worked in Philadelphia on Friday

If you could have drawn up an ideal plan for how the second-half opener would have gone in Philadelphia, Friday night would have likely resembled it.

Yu Darvish looked solid in his first outing in a week, scattering five hits and one run over 6.0 innings while striking out nine, and four different Padres hit home runs to power the offense. Sure, not every night is going to look like that (as the first half of the season easily showed), but it was a good sign that San Diego quickly buried the demons of last year's NLCS loss in Philly and showed it was ready for the challenge of getting back in the postseason hunt that lies ahead.

And speaking of Philly, did you catch the reporter who was trying to connect the dots on a Juan Soto trade to the Phillies and Rob Thomson was biting on it. The looks in the video are pretty hilarious if you're looking for a chuckle to begin your day.

San Diego Padres ready to see Robert Suarez take another step

Saturday marks a big day for the Padres bullpen as Suarez is slated to throw for Triple-A El Paso tonight when the Chihuahuas take on Sugar Land on the road.

Suarez has yet to pitch for the Padres this season because of elbow inflammation. However, his return could be a huge boost for the San Diego bullpen and could fill a need for San Diego before the MLB trade deadline.

“Each and every outing for him determines what’s next," manager Bob Melvin recently said. "We're getting a lot closer.”

We'll have more on the outing for Suarez in our news roundup tomorrow. Until then, enjoy plenty of Saturday baseball, with the double-header beginning at 10:05 a.m. (Pacific).