My team the padres are really bad and you know when....09:22 Jul 12 2009
Times Read: 749
when in the game before the padres didnt get a hit until the seventh tonight it was a different story as in seen below.
OH NO-NO! SANCHEZ SILENCES PADRES
With his father watching for the first time, Giants lefty Jonathan Sanchez throws a no-hitter
By Chris Jenkins
Union-Tribune Staff Writer
Originally published 9:44 p.m. July 10, 2009, updated 11:44 p.m., July 10, 2009
Jonathan Sanchez: Throws 13th no-hitter in Giants history and the first since John “The Count” Montefusco on Sept. 29, 1976. It is the seventh no-hitter thrown against the Padres.
Alarms went off June 7, the 18-inning game in which the Padres didn't get a hit over the last nine innings. Then there was the lingering scare Thursday night, the six-plus innings it took to record a hit against San Francisco Giants ace Tim Lincecum. Heck, there's all of the Padres history, which included fully a half-dozen games in which they were no-hit.
Make it seven. Unlucky seven. Unhittable seven.
Had Friday night's hit-free, 8-0 loss happened with Lincecum on the mound, it might have been slightly more palatable for a Padres club that's redefining the word “slump.” Jonathan Sanchez, while one of the many promising young pitchers the Giants have produced, was making his first start in more than two weeks after getting demoted to the bullpen for ineffectiveness.
And the fact Sanchez threw the no-hitter with his just-arrived father in the stands made it even more special.
“This is the first time he has seen me pitch. This is a gift for him,” said Sanchez, who struck out 11. “I feel awesome.”
“I think most of these guys in here (Padres clubhouse) have faced him before,” Padres center fielder Tony Gwynn said. “Way unexpected was the way he got ahead early and located his fastball. The first time through, all he threw was fastballs. Second time through, he was going with the breaking ball.”
It was a slider cutting in on the outside corner that got Everth Cabrera looking at strike three, the final pitch of the first no-hitter since Carlos Zambrano of the Chicago Cubs did it to the Milwaukee Brewers last year. It looked at first like Cabrera was ready to pull out all the stops to avert the no-hitter, drawing heavy boos from the crowd of 34,298 when he flashed bunt on Sanchez's first pitch of the at-bat.
“Nah, I was just trying to bring the infield in,” Cabrera said. “I wouldn't have bunted. I don't want to get the first hit on a bunt.”
One batter earlier, it appeared as if the Padres had their first hit and first run at the same time. The right-handed Edgar Gonzalez ripped into a fastball from the left-handed Sanchez, turning center fielder Aaron Rowand on his heels. Gonzalez's drive was maybe six inches beneath the upper lip of the wall when Rowand clutched it in his mitt.
“Oh yeah, I hit that ball as good as I can hit a ball, and I thought it was out,” Gonzalez said. “I know from our park that the ball doesn't travel well, but I squared up that ball tonight better than balls I've hit out of Petco.”
Until Friday night, Sanchez hadn't gone longer than 6 2/3 innings in any of his 16 appearances, but he showed no sign whatsoever of wearing out. Padres manager Bud Black theorized that the time in the bullpen may have helped Sanchez stay fresher, because he was clocking 96 mph from the start, a vast improvement over his velocity earlier this year.
“His stuff was good,” Black said. “I thought our focus was there. We were having good at-bats. He just made pitches.”
Said Sanchez: “I want to be a starter. They gave me a second chance, you see what happened tonight.”
Sanchez had struck out four straight Padres – including Gwynn, who had broken up Lincecum's bid in the seventh – when Adrian Gonzalez put a gasp into the crowd with a ball to deep left that was caught to open the eighth. Not caught was the grounder Chase Headley hit to third baseman Juan Uribe, who botched it once, then again, for the error that denied Sanchez the first perfect game since (now-teammate) Randy Johnson threw one for the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2004.
Coincidentally, Sanchez was in the lineup only because Johnson just went on the disabled list, springing Sanchez from the bullpen, his punishment for wretched starts and respite from low run support.
Meanwhile, Padres starter Josh Banks was returning to the scene of the highlight of his brief career, a complete-game victory over the Giants in which he allowed only one unearned run. By the end of the second inning Friday night, Banks trailed by four runs, all earned despite some adventuresome defense.
Travis Ishikawa opened the four-run Giants second with a triple to the sweet spot at AT&T, near the the corner in right-center where it measures 421 feet, and Banks walked Edgar Renteria. Singles by Uribe and Eli Whiteside made it 2-0, then two more came home on Rowand's single up the middle.
The last of 71 pitches thrown by Banks landed in the seats in faraway right-center, sent there with a Bonds-ish swat by Pablo Sandoval, with Rowand and Randy Winn on base.
“It was a curveball I was trying to bounce,” Banks said. “It didn't bounce.”
Clearly the new superstar in San Francisco, Sandoval responded to the crowd's chant for a curtain call, yet another bit of theatrics that have annoyed some Padres players who aren't in position to complain about anybody else's actions.
Sanchez had his share of standing ovations as well.
“It's not a good feeling,” Black said of the no-hitter. “We understand it's a special feat.”
Just as a padres fan this is one of the lowest points that I have ever seen and to tell ya the truth it will be a long time after this season that this time will be nothing more than buttom dwellers in the NL west.
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