MLB Rewind: Madison Bumgarner homers
What a day it was in the majors the first Saturday of the season. The Los Angeles Dodgers returned the favor from Friday by gaining an extra-inning win of their own against their No. 1 rival; there were problems for a Boston Red Sox third baseman; and the Colorado Rockies’ pitching was just awful against a team that was a laughing stock earlier in the week.
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The first Saturday of the MLB season also saw the Cincinnati Reds jump to first place in the NL Central, handing the Pittsburgh Pirates their first loss of the season; the Kansas City Royals continue to show their dominance by shutting out the Minnesota Twins; and two games were postponed.
There was also the fact the Philadelphia Phillies gained their first win of the season, defeating the New York Mets by a 1-0 score, and the St. Louis Cardinals scored 12 runs against the Atlanta Braves.
But with so much occurring on Saturday, here are just three occurrences that stood out, being the Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
Next: The Good: Bumgarner homers off rival
The Good: Madison Bumgarner
Not only did Madison Bumgarner have a solid day on the mound with a six-inning, one-run no-decision, but at the plate he was just as memorable, hitting a home run against three-time Cy Young Award winning pitcher Clayton Kershaw in the first inning.
To recap the day of Bumgarner, on the mound he went six innings, where he allowed just one earned run on six hits and one walk. He collected eight strikeouts in the no-decision.
Then, at the plate, Bumgarner smashed a two-out solo home run off Kershaw in the first inning, and with that said, it should also be noted that’s Bumgarner’s second career home run off Kershaw.
What made this so great was this came of rivals who are two of the best pitchers in all of baseball, plus if you watch the reaction of Kershaw after he knows the ball was hit for a home run, it just shows how frustrated it made Kershaw to give up that particular homer.
Bumgarner has pitched 11 innings this season, standing at 1-0 overall. He’s given up 11 hits and four earned runs. He showed improvement in this start compared to Opening Day, as he went from walking five batters in the season opener to walking just the one batter on Saturday afternoon.
Kershaw, on the other hand, has pitched well this season, except for the slip-up against Bumgarner. In his no-decision day, Kershaw pitched eight innings, allowing two earned runs off four hits and one walk. Kershaw struck out five and allowed a total of two home runs.
Hopefully these two will get to have another head-to-head battle later this season, and if it were to occur, it will be interesting to see if Bumgarner can get the best of the lefty Kershaw for a third time in his career.
Next: The Bad: A broken belt with an error
The Bad: Pablo Sandoval’s first start of ’16
I want to feel a little bad for Boston Red Sox third baseman Pablo Sandoval, but I just can’t, as he’s starting to waste away his career that could have been more successful, at least his time in Boston, which is entering year two.
The “bad” part of the day for this Sandoval came when during his first at-bat of the game, he swung and missed on a knuckleball thrown by R.A. Dickey, but in the process of the swing and the miss, his belt came loose. Now, here is where it got interesting … he had trouble fixing the belt, and since weight issues have been the talk for the third baseman this offseason, it just added more fuel to the fire when he struggled to get the belt properly functioning like a belt should.
On a positive note for Sandoval, he did make a nice play on the ball just before he made his throwing error, but following the game, it was reported Sandoval “declined to talk to the media.”
For the day, Sandoval had a day he’d like to forget as he was 0-for-4 with three strikeouts (he did have one walk), and in the second inning, he committed a throwing error as he played for current full-time starter Travis Shaw, who took a turn at first base in the 8-4 win by the Red Sox over the Blue Jays.
Since Sandoval has joined the Red Sox, he doesn’t seem like the same player who was known as “Kung Fu Panda,” winning World Series titles with the San Francisco Giants. He’s far from being that player, and the downfall has been tough to watch.
The good part for Sandoval is his next start can’t get much worse.
Next: The Ugly: 'Rocky Mountain Low' for pitching
The Ugly: Colorado Rockies Pitching
Entering this series, the San Diego Padres offense was completely embarrassed, and deservingly so, as they were unable to plate a run in the first three games of the 2016 season against the Los Angeles Dodgers.
My, how things have changed for the Padres when they are opposing the pitchers of the Colorado Rockies, as the Padres defeated the host Rockies, 16-3, giving the once-scoreless Padres 29 runs combined in their past two games.
On Saturday night, 14 of the 16 runs the Padres scored were earned runs, beginning with San Diego rocking Jorge De La Rosa for seven runs (all earned) in just four innings. They also forced him to walk five and hit three home runs off the lefty.
The Padres also had three earned runs each against three other Colorado pitchers, plus they had two innings (the fourth and the nine) where they scored six runs each. In all, San Diego totaled 19 hits against the Rockies Saturday, and in the two games thus far in this series, the Rockies have allowed a total of 37 hits and 27 earned runs.
Maybe the season-opening series was a harsh wake-up call for San Diego, but the Rockies are playing embarrassing baseball right now, as they were booed by their home crowd in the ninth inning.
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Get this, for a team who couldn’t plate a single run in the first three games of the season, the Padres have a total of three six-run innings in two games against the Rockies.
Baseball is a strange game, that’s for sure.