San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
MUSGROVE AT HOME AT PETCO
Padres make it three straight with strong outing from righty
Padres 7 D-backs 0
Joe Musgrove had the good nerves again as he pitched in his hometown, not for the first time but for the first time for the home team.
“I’m nervous as hell every time I come home and throw,” he said Friday. “A lot of friends are there rooting for me in my own city. I feel a lot of pressure to want to do well for them. That always seems to bring out the best in me.”
It did again Saturday. The third of the three offseason acquisitions the Padres added to their starting rotation took his turn Saturday night, and he was the best yet.
Musgrove allowed three hits in six scoreless innings, as the Padres beat the Arizona Diamondbacks
7-0.
Musgrove has been a Padres fan as long as he can remember. But he wasn’t alive the last time the team was 3-0 to start a season, which is what they became for just the fourth time in franchise history and the first time since 1984.
“It felt awesome to be on the right side of the ball tonight,” the 28-year-old Grossmont High alumnus said. “The Padres fans, ever since I was a kid, have always been diehard, whether it’s Chargers or Padres, and I know they’re extremely excited to come out and root for the team we’re running out there this year.”
He had pitched twice at Petco Park before, allowing three earned runs in 131⁄3 innings for the Pittsburgh Pirates between 2018 and ’19. But now he is wearing the jersey of the team for which he grew up cheering.
“I’ve never wanted something more than I do now to bring a championship to
this city,” he said.
Among those watching from the stands Saturday were Musgrove’s 92-year-old grandmother, his mother and father, two sisters and brother, his high school coach and probably dozens of acquaintances he didn’t know about.
So locked in was Musgrove that he said he didn’t hear his mom’s familiar whistle.
Musgrove worked quickly, used all six pitches in his arsenal multiple times and took just 78 pitches to get through his outing.
“I was in a zone tonight,” he said. “I didn’t hear anything. … I know she probably let one off. Probably the first time I haven’t heard it.”
In support of the hometown kid, the Padres continued to make themselves at home at the plate.
They forced left-hander Caleb Smith to throw 37 pitches in a tworun first inning and 26 in a two-run second.
They walked 12 times in their first two games, tied for second most in the majors, and walked three times in those first two innings. All three of those runners scored.
Manny Machado’s first hit of the season was a 375-foot home run over the right field wall that gave the Padres a 1-0 lead in the first inning. Wil Myers walked two batters later, Jake Cronenworth reached on catcher’s interference and Ha-seong Kim’s first major league hit drove in Myers and earned the young Korean a standing ovation.
Machado had three hits in his four at-bats. Myers doubled twice, driving in three runs.
Smith was done after four innings, having thrown 79 pitches.
By the time the fourth inning started, Musgrove had six strikeouts. All of them had come in a run of eight batters he set down following Ketel Marte’s one-out, first-inning single through the wide swath of dirt on the left side, open because the Padres were in a shift.
Musgrove got Marte on a fly ball to start the fourth, just the third time Marte was retired in 12 at-bats in the series. Christian Walker followed with a line drive to deep left field that Jorge Mateo leapt and caught as he crashed into the wall. Musgrove’s seventh strikeout to end the inning made it 11 consecutive batters he had set down, taking 44 pitches to do it.
The streak was stopped by Pavin Smith’s line drive single leading off the fifth. Musgrove retired the next three batters and six of his final seven.
After Yu Darvish and Blake Snell both went 42⁄3 innings in their Padres debuts with their pitch counts passing through the 80s too quickly to go further, Musgrove was at just 66 pitches through five innings.
Musgrove has not shied from acknowledging his excitement about pitching at Petco Park, where his family had season tickets in the stands beyond right field and he watched in awe of Jake Peavy, whose number 44 he now wears.
“I had a lot of good memories here,” Musgrove said. “… Having this fan base be my home crowd, I remember what it was like when this team was competitive to come and see the L.A. rivalry and how intense things got.
“For it being a limited capacity tonight, I’m excited to see what this place looks like for a Dodger Series or even when they let more fans back in. I think we’re in a real good spot this year, and if I can continue to stay locked in with this kind of offense and defense behind me I think I’ve got a chance to win a lot of games.”