Thanks to Jonathan Sanchez, this sort of bland, unsexy series featuring two teams at the top of their division but out of the ESPN spotlight, may have regained some of its sexiness. At least a smidge.
If you're not familiar, Sanchez' guaranteed a sweep of the 1st place Padres in this weekend's pivotal series in San Francisco. The obnoxious thing about it, Sanchez had just come off 4 innings pitched while giving up 4 runs in a loss. What was he thinking? Probably trying to psyche his team up. Not smart from your #4 starter.
The Giants came off a nice series against the Cubs, in which they took 3 of 4 games, which is what they were supposed to do. The Cubs are a poor team.
But it was a good challenge for the Giants. They knew who they were going to meet over the weekend, but they didn't let that psyche them out and possibly lose ground to the Padres.
Quite the opposite in fact. In this Cubs series, we were introduced to two new faces that could lead this Giants' penant run: Pat Burrell and Pablo Sandoval...finally.
Burrell had a gargantuan series, easily the hottest player on the Giants, and Sandoval is getting going just when the Giants need him the most, making the fact that Sabean has yet to get a legit bat in the line-up very miniscule at this point. Sabean can thank these two players.
As for the weekend shindig at AT&T Park, the Padres may have the edge. San Diego sends 2 of their best starters against the worst the Giants have to offer. Lucky for the Giants, both Sanchez and Bumgarner (the worst the Giants have to offer) are just about in tune with Richard and Latos, who are throwing for SD.
But in this first game of the series, all eyes will be on Sanchez. He opened his mouth, now he has to back it up. And an outing like he had in Atlanta will get him booed right out of the starting rotation come playoff time.
These Padres are for real, though. Don't belittle them. No matter how much the analysts told you they wouldn't be this season, or even how much they are going to go down in flames in the 2nd half of the season. They're here to stay. They made the moves at the trade deadline that they needed, and they have the young, solid pitching willing to go the distance for the rest of the season. Also, they haven't faltered at all this last week, and expect nothing less this weekend.
The series will be pressure-filled, maybe even a little dirty with some words exchanged, but this is a statement series for one team in a 3-game series. The Padres riding high, the Giants riding higher. This weekend series will tell us a lot about how this NL West race will go down.
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