Good morning from Boston,
Aside from the five runs the Nationals scored against Tom Cosgrove and Adrián Morejón in the ninth inning, the Padres played a fine game yesterday.
Even if you allow for the virtually inevitable ebbs and flows of a bullpen, the Padres have a pen problem. Potentially a big one.
We’ve talked about that before, and we’ll talk about it later in today’s newsletter.
But an 8-5 victory that completed a sweep of a team that came in hot offered an opportunity to focus on some positive developments.
One: The Padres have won seven of their past eight games for the first time this season.
Two: Kyle Higashioka is on a heater.
Three: The version of Dylan Cease the Padres need was back.
You can read in my game story (here) how the only sane victory in the series went down.
Let’s talk Cease.
He spoke after his previous start, in which he allowed four runs while striking out 10 in 4⅔ innings, about his “process” having been better and that he was close to being where he wanted to be.
He put it together yesterday, allowing one hit over seven innings for the second time this season — the first being May 8.
In his eight starts since then, he had done this:
That followed his beginning the season with eight starts that looked like this:
Cease didn’t waste a lot of pitches while striking out nine and walking two yesterday. When he is on like that, the fastball and slider combination make him one of the best in the majors.
Here is a video showing how those two pitches play off each other:
Dylan Cease, 96mph Fastball and 87mph Slider, Overlay. pic.twitter.com/SMXolTrDYH
— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) June 26, 2024
So what has changed?
“Just focusing on the right things and getting reps with it,” Cease said, “And then it just becomes a little more automatic, and then you can just build on it.”
He has been working on one thing in particular, and it did not have to do with mechanics.
“It’s what you’re focused on,” he said. “You can be focused on mechanics or this or that. You can be focused on the target. Right now I’m more focused on the target, and that has really helped.”
Changing
Cease had his most productive day with his changeup yesterday.
He threw it just four times. It remains something of a novelty. But it could be trending toward being something more.
He got his first swing-and-miss of the season with the pitch. He also got two groundouts and threw a ball.
Of the 18 changeups he had thrown before yesterday, one got an out, three were called strikes and 14 were called balls.
“I had a good feel for it today,” he said. “It’s probably never going to be my strike pitch, but when I’m feeling it like that, I can use it.”
The changeup has hardly even been a show-me pitch in recent seasons. Cease throws it less than three percent of the time. He throws it slower than 70 mph most of the time. (Of the eight changeups he has thrown harder than 70.8 mph this season, four came yesterday. He said the increase was not intentional, but the velocity has been creeping up.)
He never throws it after there having more than one ball called in a count and rarely throws it early in the game.
“Just to throw a little wrinkle in there,” Cease said recently.
The reality is it barely gets to the plate sometimes.
Told last month that it is funny to see him mix it in, Cease replied, “It makes me laugh too. It is kind of funny.”
Pulling his weight
Higashioka’s first multi-homer game since June 12, 2022, gave him seven home runs in his past 42 at-bats.
This is by far the greatest power surge of his career. He hit 10 home runs in each of the past three seasons while logging between 211 and 260 at-bats.
It’s not that the 34-year-old has found the fountain of youth or discovered some other secret.
What he figured out was a little more plain than that.
“In years past, I’ve hit a lot of hard-hit balls to center,” he said. “Like 103, 104 (mph), and they don’t get out. Now, it’s like I’m pulling the ball down the line and every time I’m hitting it in the air at 103, it’s out.”
That makes all the sense in the world. Not only is power generally easier to generate when pulling the ball, the wall in left field is closer to home plate than the wall in center. Like 50 to 80 feet closer, depending on the ballpark.
Higashioka maintained he is not trying to pull the ball and has not made a swing adjustment. He is staying out front and ready to hit the right pitch.
“I’m also not fighting it either,” he said. “My natural ability is to pull the ball. I’m just making sure I can keep it that direction just good enough that when I get it, it’s fair.”
Kyle Higashioka – San Diego Padres (8)
pic.twitter.com/QPGMjYDmY6— MLB HR Videos (@MLBHRVideos) June 27, 2024
That was video of Higashioka’s grand slam in yesterday’s eighth inning. You don’t need to see his two-run blast in the second inning, because if you’ve seen one you have essentially seen the other.
Check out Higashioka’s spray chart for his home runs this season.
That’s a big difference from his first 40 career home runs, from 2019 through ‘23.
It is difficult to believe that even when Luis Campusano (thumb) returns from the IL Higashioka won’t remain the Padres’ primary catcher — for as long as he stays hot.
Campusano began the season batting .281 with a .758 OPS over his first 128 plate appearances. But even with recent improvement, he is batting .167 with a .502 OPS in 92 plate appearances since then. And his ability to help control the run game is lacking, as runners have succeeded 96.9 percent (31 of 32) of the time they have attempted to steal while he is catching.
We must always remember the pitcher plays a big part in holding runners, but Higashioka is having no such trouble.
Higashioka ended yesterday’s first inning by gunning down Lane Thomas attempting to steal second base. He has thrown out six of the past 13 runners to have attempted to steal while he is behind the plate.
Higashioka has caught 11 runners attempting to steal this season, tied for fifth in the majors. And his 253 innings behind the plate are 100 fewer than any catcher ahead of him. Higashioka’s 34.5 percent caught stealing rate is second best in the majors among catchers who have caught at least 200 innings.
Higashioka is the second Padres catcher to ever have at least six RBIs in a game. Ramon Hernandez had seven on Sept. 27, 2005, but he did not throw out a runner that day.
Pen trouble
The Padres are earnestly seeking relief help on the trade market. Some around the league have perceived it as the team’s top priority for weeks.
Why might that idea have merit?
Since reaching a season-best 3.46 ERA collectively on May 28, Padres relievers have a 5.52 ERA over the past 27 games.
And it’s not getting better.
That mark is 6.23 over the past 12 games. The bullpen has allowed at least one run in all 12 of those games and allowed at least three runs in 10 of them.
Yuki Matsui is the only Padres reliever to have not allowed a run in that time.
Enyel De Los Santos has allowed at least one run in three of five appearances, Jeremiah Estrada has done so in four of six appearances, Morejón in two of six appearances and Cosgrove in two of three in that span.
Here are the stats for the nine relievers who have pitched in the 12 games since June 15:
Rest coming
The Padres just finished a stretch of 13 games in 13 days, 26 games in 27 days and 39 games in 41 days.
“Yeah, spun out of that cycle, and I think we spun out pretty well,” manager Mike Shildt said. “Guys really stepped up, played the game. A lot of grit, a lot of determination, a lot of contributions from one through 26. And we’ve had some additions to the roster that have stepped in and done a nice job as well. So, yeah, just says a lot about the club.”
That is the brave talk. And while it might be the truth, the Padres are also grateful that some relief from the grind is on the way.
Here is their upcoming schedule, which has just 17 games in the next 26 days.
Extending that look into early August, the Padres play 28 games in the next 40 days. That is 12 off days. They have had a game on all but nine of the past 59 days. (They also played one doubleheader caused by a rainout.)
This means the ongoing recovery of their four stars on the injured list — Xander Bogaerts, Yu Darvish, Joe Musgrove and Fernando Tatis Jr. — can progress without them missing as many games.
For instance, if Bogaerts were to return in 12 days, he would miss just nine more games. If Darvish was to return around the same time, it could mean the equivalent of him missing one less start than if the Padres were playing every day in the interim. And if Tatis does return by the beginning of August, he will have missed 25 games over the course of six weeks. Musgrove’s earliest return is probably late July, and if that is the case he could make as many as 11 starts before the end of the season.
All that is theory and almost entirely out of the Padres’ control.
What the team can do is manipulate rest for their healthy starting pitchers.
The plan before Darvish started experiencing elbow pain and was shut down late last week was for the Padres to stay on turn. They planned to use five starters, which would provide several times through the rotation with starters getting five or six or even seven days’ rest.
There has been no word whether they might now skip rookie Adam Mazur (or someone else) once or twice. That might seem like a good idea if Cease is going to be the good Cease. But the fact is they have been counting on this period for Michael King to get some rest, as he is in his first season as a full-time starter.
Jhony Brito was sent down to Triple-A to build up to become a starter, and they almost certainly will add at least one starting pitcher via trade.
Even if they stayed on turn with their current five starters, no starter should have to pitch on less than five days’ rest more than once over the next four times through the rotation.
Tidbits
- Imaging on Darvish’s right elbow was “clean” and “encouraging,” according to Shildt. The elbow was bothering Darvish and prevented him from making his return from the IL on Tuesday. Darvish stayed in San Diego and is expected to resume throwing this week.
- First baseman Luis Arraez did not play in yesterday’s game due to what Shildt called “a little ouchy” in his left hand. It appears to have happened when he slid into third base with a triple on Tuesday night.
- Bogaerts took batting practice on the field yesterday for the first time since fracturing the glenoid bone in his left shoulder socket on May 20. He has been taking grounders for more than a week and began throwing Monday. Bogaerts, who is on this trip, has talked about a rehab assignment starting in early July.
- The Padres (44-41) just-completed 6-1 homestand was their most successful since they went 9-1 from June 17-27, 2021. Word of caution culled from recent history: The Padres were 47-33 on June 27, 2021. Then, unable to overcome a pile of injuries to their starting rotation, they collapsed late in the season and finished 79-83.
- In his first major league game since May 4, Eguy Rosario got back to doing what he does — getting extra-base hits. He hit his sixth double yesterday. He also has three home runs and four singles. Rosario is batting .250 (13-for-52) with an .829 OPS. Jeff Sanders wrote in yesterday’s game preview (here) about Rosario getting work in the outfield.
- Jurickson Profar extended his hitting streak to 10 games. He is batting just .275 (11-for-40) but has 10 RBIs during the streak.
- I wrote in yesterday’s newsletter about Estrada’s recent illness, and I mentioned he had COVID in 2019. Well, that was incorrect. He was not among the first humans to acquire the virus. It was in 2021 that Estrada battled COVID.
All right, that’s it for me. I need a nap.
No game today. So no newsletter tomorrow. Jeff Sanders will have a story on our Padres page today about Jackson Merrill’s Rookie of the Year candidacy.
Talk to you Saturday.
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