The San Diego Padres and Los Angeles Dodgers conclude their two-game Seoul Series on Thursday in South Korea on Tuesday with the Padres looking bounce back after blowing a late lead in Game One.
San Diego Padres vs. Los Angeles Dodgers (-192, 8.5)
Both teams throw starting pitchers that had rough Spring Trainings with Joe Musgrove’s posting a 13.50 ERA in his three appearances in Spring Training while Yoshinobu Yamamoto had an 8.38 ERA in his three Spring Training appearances.
For Yamamoto, this will be his first regular season MLB start after posting a 1.16 ERA in the Nippon Baseball League with the Orix Buffaloes last season, but will have a learning curve to overcome with the element of the pitch clock being new to him.
As for Musgrove, he’s coming off of pitching very well at the end of 2023, posting a 1.84 ERA and 9-1 record in his last 12 starts, but missed the final two-plus months of the season due to injury.
Musgrove began the 2023 season allowing at least three runs in four of his first five starts before finding his groove in the aforementioned final 12 start stretch and the Spring Training issues have to present concern that going against the Dodgers on Thursday may present a similar rough start in 2024.
The Dodgers last season led the league in runs per game away from home with over 5.8 runs per game when away from Dodger Stadium, and that was without Shohei Ohtani, who was signed in the offseason to a record-breaking $700 million contract.
As for the Padres, the fact that they play their home games at PetCo Park often causes their offensive numbers to be negatively impacted with how pitcher-friendly the park is. Last season, the Padres averaged more than 4.9 runs per game on the road compared to just 4.35 runs per game at home with a higher home runs per at-bat rate on the road than at home.
The Gocheok Sky Dome, the venue for Thursday’s game, is the home of the Kiwoom Heroes of the Korean Baseball Organization and routinely is in the bottom three in the league in terms of home run rate among the league’s ballparks, but its dimensions are relatively on par with the conditions the Padres and Dodgers face for trying to hit home runs.
With it being the first start of the season for both starters after each had a bad Spring Training? The bullpens figure to get a lot of work after being heavily utilized in Game One.
Neither starting pitcher exceeded 77 pitches on Wednesday and with both teams having starters that entered this series in rough form, it will lead to a high scoring conclusion to the Seoul Series.
The Play: Padres vs. Dodgers Over 8.5
See which team DraftKings bettors are backing.
