7-1 win that dispossessed the Giants of brooms.<\/a><\/p>\nNick Pivetta allowed no runs and one hit in five innings as the Padres (2-4) finally could match a power starter against a Giants (2-4) team vulnerable to hard stuff.<\/p>\n
The offense got two doubles from Gavin Sheets and a key single from Jackson Merrill before No. 5 hitter Ram\u00f3n Laureano, off to a hot start to his contract year, tagged a two-run home run that inflated a 3-1 lead in the eighth.<\/p>\n
Giants first baseman Casey Schmitt helped the home team, too.<\/p>\n
The San Diego State alum failed to catch two-out throws in the first and sixth innings, allowing Merrill and Sheets to score the game\u2019s first and second runs.<\/p>\n
Of course, it all came before a capacity crowd. Announced at 41,491, it was the sixth full house in six tries.<\/p>\n
Color Laureano, still something of a Padres newcomer, as impressed by the vocal support.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fans give us more energy and more focus,\u201d said the 31-year-old, a former Athletics, Braves, Guardians and Orioles outfielder who came over in August. \u201cThey\u2019re doing a tremendous job.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes you take it for granted \u2014 it\u2019s what we\u2019ve come to expect,\u201d manager Craig Stammen said of big crowds. \u201cBut this fan base is pretty awesome. They are a home-field advantage for us.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we get cooking like we were \u2014 the guys are running the bases and the other team\u2019s throwing the ball away \u2014 you can definitely feel that energy and feel that support behind us,\u201d said the former reliever.<\/p>\n
Older Padres fans never yawn at a ballpark full of Padres fans.<\/p>\n
They remember when the visiting team attracted more fans than the Padres did.<\/p>\n
The Giants were one of those clubs.<\/p>\n
For Padres fans present, that vibe could be obnoxious.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I played here, especially early on, it felt more like a home game played from (the Giants\u2019) home,\u201d said Posey.\u00a0\u201cWhereas now, it\u2019s obviously arguably one of the best atmospheres in baseball.\u201d<\/p>\n
What changed?<\/p>\n
One, the Giants cooled off.\u00a0Led by Posey and several other homegrown stars, San Francisco won three World Series trophies between 2010 and 2014, but it hasn\u2019t made much noise in recent years.<\/p>\n
Posey and Co. had made Giants home games such a hot ticket that many folks in the Bay Area made the trip to San Diego to see their team. The tickets were cheaper and more available here, a fact not lost on Giants fans in Southern California, either.<\/p>\n
In 2012, Petco Park\u2019s outfield shrank, making the games more entertaining in a ballpark that had played as big as Yellowstone National Park.<\/p>\n
\u201cI look back at Adri\u00e1n Gonz\u00e1lez\u00a0and some of the numbers he put up here, and they really are remarkable,\u201d Posey said of the first baseman, who really should be in the Padres\u2019 Hall of Fame by now for his efforts between 2006 and 2010.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt definitely is more hitter-friendly now than back then,\u201d added Posey, who batted .301 with a stunning .507 slugging rate in 73 games here.<\/p>\n
Other developments would contribute to the small-market Padres becoming attendance giants.<\/p>\n
The Chargers moved, uninvited, to Greater Los Angeles in 2017. Major League Baseball added a wild card playoff berth to the National League in 2012 and again in 2022.<\/p>\n
Most of all, the Padres went from irrelevance in the annual playoff race to a consistent contender, while regulars such as Fernando Tatis, Jr., Manny Machado, Joe Musgrove and Jake Cronenworth built large followings among the fans.<\/p>\n
So nowadays, when Padres fans stand in the seventh inning for \u201cTake Me Out to the Ballgame,\u201d they\u2019re no longer drowned out by San Francisco fans bellowing, \u201croot, root, root for the Giiiants.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fans thundered \u201cPaaadres\u201d on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Letting out a final roar when Mason Miller struck out the last Giant, the Friar faithful sent the team toward Boston, where it will begin a six-game road trip starting Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Buster Posey appreciates what the Padres and their fans have done with the place. Full houses. Actual Padres…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":658126,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2407],"tags":[5,853,4,43,137,18,4339,4338,185],"class_list":{"0":"post-658125","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego-padres","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-latest-headlines","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-padres","12":"tag-san-diego","13":"tag-san-diego-padres","14":"tag-sandiego","15":"tag-sandiegopadres","16":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116333362835896829","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=658125"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658125\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=658125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=658125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=658125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}