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Posted at 12:30 PM EST. 

The Padres are the NL’s version of the White Sox. Both spent money in the off-season and many had picked both of them to be legit playoff contenders before the season started. Both have had very decent pitching all-season but their hitting has been weak. The White Sox bats woke up over the past couple of weeks and now we may be seeing the Padres bats come to life as well. San Diego has some thunder in their lineup and they just went into New York (Mets) and scored 15 runs over the last two games. The Padres figure to get lots more scoring opportunities against David Phelps here. Phelps has pretty much been the same guy for three years and counting with decent command, a low swing and miss rate (5%) and below-league-average skills. His versatility is much more valuable to his MLB team than to you. As the chalk, pitching for the Marlins, Phelps is instant fade material.

Ian Kennedy is 6-9 with a 4.58 ERA over 18 starts. Those numbers look even worse when you consider that he pitches half his games at Petco Park. We say, “Don’t give up on this guy”. Kennedy's skills are so much better than his surface stats. He continues to generate plenty of swings and misses, and is striking out a batter per inning for the second consecutive season. Kennedy has been the victim of some very bad luck, as his hit rate, strand rate, and especially his home run per fly ball rate are currently on the wrong side of league average. The hit rate is in line with his usual level, but the home runs are sure to slow down. Kennedy had just one disaster in 2014, but has already had five in 18 starts this year. Over his last five starts, Kennedy has a BB/K split of 6/24 over 27 frames to go along with an ERA of 3.29. Kennedy is having a rotten year on the stat sheet but there doesn't appear to be anything wrong with his skills. He's striking out plenty of batters and his xERA (3.52) isn't far off last year's mark. His strand rate is very low and his home run per fly ball rate is the highest in the majors among starting pitchers. Those marks should normalize going forward, so Kennedy should post some decent ratios from this point on, along with his typically solid strikeout totals. 

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