Petco Park – San Diego, California

Following a thrilling 9-8 victory over the Cubs, the Padres looked to go from turning their fortunes around offensively to maintaining that offensive strut. 

It would not come on this April night in the Gaslamp. 

The San Diego Padres dropped their eighth game of the season to the Cubs by a 5-1 score.

Joe Musgrove got the start for the Friars on the third anniversary of his no-hitter, and he had a game plan in this start. As noted by our fellow EVT writer Clark Fahrenthold, several Cubs batters have struggled against the curveball in their careers, as well as last season. Musgrove came out leaning on the curveball heavily, throwing 11 in the first inning out of 22 pitches in that frame.

On the night, Musgrove threw the curve 35% of the time, getting seven whiffs on fifteen swings. It would seem that the game plan was working.

Until it didn’t. A hanging curveball by Musgrove was teed off on in the fifth inning by Cubs catcher Yan Gomes, giving the Cubs a 1-0 lead.

Musgrove would not make it out of the fifth, leaving with the bases loaded and no out. Stephen Kolek would be called upon in search of a ground ball out. That would also not come to be, as Christopher Morel deposited a sweeper into the left field seats to make it a 5-0 ballgame. The Padres’ lone run came in the sixth inning, where Eguy Rosario hit a pinch-hit home run to make the score 5-1. 

Cubs starter Ben Brown, in what was his first Major League start, held the Padres scoreless over four and two-thirds innings, walking only one and punching out five batters. Brown also induced two double plays, which helped him navigate deep counts and 77 pitches thrown. The Cubs’ bullpen did their job, with Drew Smyly surrendering their lone run over 1 ⅓ innings, and the trio of Yency Almonte, Mark Leiter Jr, and Adbert Alzolay held the Padres scoreless and hitless to close out the game. 

After today’s final, the Padres are at risk of being winless in their fourth straight series to open the year. The team looks to prevent that from happening tomorrow at 3:40 pm, with Dylan Cease on the mound.

Diego Garcia

A born and raised San Diegan, Diego Garcia is a lifetime Padres fan and self-proclaimed baseball nerd. Diego wrote about baseball on his own site between 2021-22 before joining the East Village Times team in 2024. He also posts baseball content on his YouTube channel “Stat Nerd Baseball”, creating content around trades, hypotheticals, player analyses, the San Diego Padres, and MLB as a whole.

A 2024 graduate of San Diego State, Diego aims to grow as a writer and content creator in the baseball community.