Padres Star Refuses To Give Dodgers Pitching Staff Credit For Shutting Them Down
The Dodgers pitching staff held the Padres scoreless for 24 consecutive innings, making it the longest postseason drought in over three decades. However, San Diego outfielder Jurickson Profar refused to give credit where credit was due.
It’s a tough task being a villain. It’s easy to have things to say when you’re winning, but when you’ve lost, the smirks vanish and a seed of bitterness is planted.
“We did a lot of unusual things,” Profar said. “We don’t want to give credit either, you know, to their pitching. We just didn’t come through.”
October is certainly an unusual time for teams that aren’t built to endure the postseason. Just ask the Dodgers teams that fell short in 2022 and 2023.
Unlike Profar, Fernando Tatis Jr. gave the Dodgers bullpen credit for shutting San Diego down.
“Give credit to everybody who deserves credit,” Tatis told Kevin Acee of The San Diego Union-Tribune. “They pitched good. Simple as that. We gave our best battle.”
Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched five scoreless innings in the win-or-go-home matchup Friday night. The Dodgers bullpen did the rest.
The only threat of the game came in the third inning when Kyle Higashioka and Luis Arraez were both on base and Yamamoto faced Tatis. The Padres outfielder grounded out, which resulted in a double play to end the frame.
After that, the Padres were silent. None of San Diego’s final 19 batters reached base.
The Dodgers faced a 2-1 deficit following a heartbreaking 6-5 loss in Game 3 of the National League Division Series. The Padres let back-to-back games slip away from them.
But the two victories San Diego did have were full of taunts and mockery from Padres players, specifically Profar, Tatis, and Manny Machado.
Profar let Mookie Betts think he hit a home run in Game 2, until revealing he had actually robbed him. Tatis blew kisses to angry Dodgers fans. Machado threw a ball to the Dodgers dugout, allegedly in the direction of Dave Roberts.
It was a horrific sight, but the Dodgers didn’t seem to care about the taunts. They focused on playing the game, and it paid off.
However, Profar managed to stoop even lower than rock bottom with his defiance to give credit to the Dodgers pitching staff.
As the series went down the 5 freeway to Petco Park, Padres manager Mike Shildt reminded fans to “stay classy, San Diego,” yet his own player failed to follow the mantra following the Game 5 loss to the Dodgers.
Photo Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images
Have you subscribed to our YouTube channel? Subscribe and hit that notification bell to stay up to date on all the latest Dodgers news, rumors, interviews, livestreams, and more!
