Darvish dishes up yet another deep start

SAN DIEGO -- No matter what happens this weekend, the Padres will enter the second half of their season with serious question marks. The Trade Deadline looms, and the offense could still use an upgrade. Injury concerns abound.

Those question marks aren’t going anywhere. But the Padres would sure feel a lot better about things if they could reel off a few victories this weekend and put their recent sloppy play behind them. It’d make for a happier All-Star break, at least.

“You want to go into the break on a positive note, try to put a bad stretch behind you,” manager Bob Melvin mused on Friday afternoon, hours before first pitch against the D-backs. “These three games could be significant in that.”

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They’re off to a good start. The Padres’ returned home with a 5-3 victory over Arizona at Petco Park, precisely the type of complete team win they were looking for after they dropped three of four in Colorado during the week.

“There’s still some spots that we feel like we need to clean up,” Melvin said afterward. “But any time you have a tough series like we did, you get home in front of our crowd, you feel that much better. You’re in San Diego. To be able to get a win like that in front of a big crowd, that always inspires us here. That puts that road trip in Colorado in the rearview mirror.”

Yu Darvish continued to establish himself as one of the sport’s premier workhorses, pitching seven innings of three-run ball while throwing 114 pitches. Darvish has eclipsed the 100-pitch mark in each of his last seven starts, and he has completed seven innings on eight occasions this year. Only three pitchers have more.

Clearly, Darvish is relishing the opportunity. He had thrown 100 pitches when he emerged for the top of the seventh inning, and he promptly retired each of the first two hitters via ground balls, setting up a showdown with D-backs leadoff man Josh Rojas.

“He’s just having a lot of fun out there, just doing what he does and mixing his pitches,” catcher Austin Nola said of Darvish. “... That’s really what it is for him, the enjoyment of being able to make adjustments throughout the game to what they’re doing -- the chess match.”

Darvish started Rojas with a hard cutter, and Rojas fouled it off. The right-hander followed with a splitter that caught the bottom of the zone. Rojas watched for strike two.

“As soon as we saw that bottom-of-the-zone take, it was like, ‘All right, now we know he’s got to respect that part of the zone,” Nola said. “So if it starts there, he’s either going to have to swing, or he’s going to have to be really disciplined to take it again.”

Darvish followed with another splitter, this one nastier, at Rojas’ ankles. The D-backs’ third baseman flailed for strike three, and Darvish hopped off the mound. He pumped both fists, before letting loose a scream.

“When [Melvin] gives you that inning, you want to go out there, you want to shut them down,” Darvish said. “The plan for me was to throw that splitter and strike him out. I was able to do that.”

Evidently, Darvish and Melvin have had something of a playful back-and-forth across Darvish’s past few starts. The veteran has let Melvin know he wants to pitch even deeper into games than he already is. On Friday night, Melvin obliged. This was Darvish’s highest pitch count in more than five years.

“Honestly, he’s probably the one guy I don’t worry about pitch counts at all,” Melvin said. “Especially pitching on the sixth day. One of the reasons we do it is so we’re able to send some guys out there, and he’s probably the guy that’s well equipped to throw 120 pitches.”

The Padres gave Darvish a lead in the bottom of the second inning on Nola’s two-run double. Nola finished with a pair of hits, as did shortstop Ha-Seong Kim. Jurickson Profar returned from the concussion injured list by reaching base twice, via a pair of walks. Nick Martinez and Taylor Rogers each pitched a scoreless frame in relief.

It was a complete team victory, coming mere hours after superstar shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr. received clearance to ramp up his swinging progression as he rehabs his surgically repaired left wrist.

All in all, a positive day for the Padres from start to finish. Those have been rare lately.