SAN DIEGO — Not all that often has there been a collection of hitters at the top of one team’s lineup like Xander Bogaerts, Juan Soto and Manny Machado.
Eventually, it will matter.
And it will matter on a night like Friday, when a pitcher like Nick Martinez deserved better than he got from the defenders behind him and the hitters supposedly there to support him in what ended up being a 4-1 loss to the Colorado Rockies.
“When you only score one, it doesn’t look good,” manager Bob Melvin said. “But I thought he pitched really well.”
Martinez matched a career high by going seven innings in his season debut. He allowed four runs, which is twice as many as he would have allowed if not for a rare gaffe by Machado.
At some point — and there was still time for it to happen on Friday — the Padres will score a lot of runs. They will string together hits. They won’t go down quickly in at-bat after at-bat.
But two game into this season of great expectations, it has not.
The Padres have totaled three runs on 11 hits, are 0-for-14 with runners in scoring position.
“It’s a small sample,” Melvin said. “Look, everybody is trying to get their share of hits, drive in some runs. And when you’re down, even more so. If we get a couple runs early, probably relax a little bit more. But we’re trying to win as many games as we can here at home. We want to get off to a good start and we just haven’t done it.”
They have trailed almost the entirety of their two games, and they haven’t looked good doing it — that is, aside from their sharp pinstriped home uniforms Thursday and popping City Connect uniforms on Friday.
They were down from the start Friday for the second night in a row. And the main reason was because they weren’t playing well on either side of the ball.
No errors were charged in the first inning, but it was far from a clean frame.
Martinez took two pitches to get the first before Kris Bryant lined a single to left field.
Charlie Blackmon then skied a ball the other way to shallow left field. Two things conspired to turn that from an out to a single. The first was Soto taking several steps directly to his right before sprinting in and sliding too late to make the catch. It might not have mattered had third baseman Machado not been lined up at shortstop with Bogaerts, the shortstop, playing close to second base, making for a longer run for Machado.
That left runners at first and second, and a C.J. Cron walk loaded the bases with one out.
It appeared Martinez was about to get out of the inning unscathed when Ryan McMahon grounded a ball to Machado, who threw to second base to start what would have been an inning-ending double play had he thrown in front of Bogaerts instead of essentially directly at the base as Bogaerts crossed the bag. The extenuating circumstance this time was that second baseman Ha-Seong Kim, who would normally take the throw from Machado, had been shifted toward first base.
At worst, it should have been 0-0 for longer.
That is also the best it could have been, too, because the Padres had just one hit — a bloop double by Ha-Seong Kim that two Rockies outfielders lost in the twilight — against Rockies starter Kyle Freeland through four innings.
Martinez had retired 10 of 11 batters when Rockies No.9 hitter Ezequiel Tovar led off the fifth inning with a single. Martinez then got two outs before Blackmon hit a fastball over the wall in right field to make it 4-0.
The Padres’ only other hits in Freeland’s six innings were another double by Kim and a single by Bogaerts to start the sixth. The latter hit was followed by Soto popping out and Machado grounding into a double play.
Kim led off the eighth inning with a single, and Trent Grisham followed with a walk. After Jose Azocar moved them both up a base with a sacrifice bunt, Bogaerts’ sacrifice fly scored Kim. Soto then watched a 2-2 fastball from Brad Hand get called for a strike on the outside corner. Soto, who walked in the first inning, is 0-for-7 on the season.
Machado reached on an error to start the ninth inning, falling to 1-for-7. Nelson Cruz followed with a pop out. Jake Cronenworth, still seeking his first hit, struck out. Pinch-hitter Matt Carpenter grounded out to end the game.
