Road Trip!
We begin in sunny Southern California, with three games against the Padres of San Diego.
The Padres have played 20 seasons at Petco Park and there was once a time when Petco Park was, quite simply, the toughest place to score runs in the history of baseball. I am a simple fellow, and I use a simple method to arrive at these dramatic conclusions - in this case, I merely compared the number of runs a team scores and allows at home with the number they score and allow on the road. Petco didn't suppress offense as much as Coors Feild boosted it - but it was still in a class all its own.By my reckoning, it was the toughest place to score runs every season from 2004 through 2009, ranking 30th out 30 every single year. Over the next three years, things improved just marginally - it came in 26th, 28th, and 26th again. Over their first nine seasons at Petco Park (2004-2012) just 81.1% as many runs were scored there as were scored in the Padres' road games. And that is the greatest suppression of offense in MLB history - more drastic than the Astrodome, than Dodger Stadium, than the original Yankee Stadium of Ruth and Gehrig.
So after the 2012 season they decided to try moving the fences in. Did it help?
It did, a little. In those first nine seasons at Petco, the Padres and their opponents hit 1490 homers in neiutral parks and just 1,133 at Petco - to put it another way, 57% of homers in Padres games were hit in neutral aparks and just 43% at Petco. In the eleven seasons since they moved the fences, it's been much more balanced - there have been 1,890 HRs hit in neutral parks, and 1,768 hit at Petrco - it's now 52% on the road and 48% at Petco. It's still a great pitcher's park - the Padres and their opponents score and allow just 89.5% runs as opposed to what happens in neutral park, which still makes it one of the greatest pitcher's parks in the game's history. But it's not nearly as extreme as it was during those first nine seasons. Twice in fact (2016 and 2018), the Padres and their oppoents actually produced more runs (just barely, but even so!) at Petco than they did elsewhere. Now San Francisco or Kansas City is just as likely to have the biggest negative impact on offense.
Kansas City's the next stop? This particular road trip isn't taking the Jays anywhere likely to unlock the offense...
Matchups!!
Fri 19 April - Rodriguez (0-0, 2.45) vs Waldron (0-1, 3.14)
Sat 20 April - Berrios (3-0, 1.05) vs Hu Nose (?-?, ?.??)
Sun 21 April - Bassitt (2-2, 4.03) vs Musgrove (2-2, 6.29)
https://www.battersbox.ca/article.php?story=20240419180658969