Padres, Rangers counting on veteran pitchers to deliver

Two veteran pitchers who have underachieved of late will square off in San Diego Saturday night in a game both of their teams need.

Left-hander Martin Perez (8-3, 4.91 ERA) will start for the Texas Rangers against Padres' right-hander Yu Darvish.

The Rangers are clinging to a two-game lead in the American League West, although they are 2-5 over the past seven games and would drop a third straight series with a loss Saturday night. This downturn comes after the Rangers won six straight games coming out of the All-Star break.

Meanwhile, the Padres played a strong all-around game in Friday night's 7-1 win over the Rangers.

"Pretty spirited," Padres manager Bob Melvin said. "It feels good to play a game like that."

The question facing the Padres is whether they can they play two, three or four straight games like that. They have yet to win more than three games in a row this season.

So, both teams have a mission for their struggling pitchers on Saturday -- the Rangers for Martin to be the stopper, the Padres for Darvish to get the momentum rolling. Were this last year, rival managers Melvin and Bruce Bochy would be considerably more confident.

"Darvish has just hit a bump," Melvin said recently. "He knows how to make adjustments. ... He'll make them."

"Martin is one of those guys you count on," Bochy said. "Even when he's struggling, he keeps us in games."

Clearly, however, neither pitcher is what he was in 2022, or even earlier this season.

The 36-year-old Darvish last year finished with a 16-8 record and a 3.10 ERA. This season, he's 7-7 with a 4.80 ERA. And despite a 2-1 record in his first four starts this month, Darvish has a 4.64 ERA in July.

Perez, 32, finished 12-8 last season with a 2.89 ERA. He also gave up just 11 home runs in 196 1/3 innings. This season, Perez has surrendered 18 home runs in 102 2/3 innings, including a first-inning grand slam to Max Muncy of the Los Angeles Dodgers in his most recent outing. Over his three starts in July, Perez is 1-0 despite a 9.49 ERA, giving up 13 runs on 17 hits and eight walks with eight strikeouts in 12 1/3 innings.

Perez will be making his 20th start of the season Saturday and his third career appearance (second start) against the Padres. He has a 2.16 ERA against the Padres in 8 1/3 innings.

Darvish spent his first four-plus seasons in the United States (2012-17) with the Rangers. He has pitched against the Rangers only once, that game coming on March 30, 2019, as a member of the Chicago Cubs. He gave up three runs on two hits and seven walks in 2 2/3 innings and didn't figure into the decision.

The Padres follow this series with three games against the Colorado Rockies, who enter play Saturday with the worst record in the National League. Then, they'll begin a crucial stretch in August that will help to determine their fortunes in the NL playoff race.

Between Aug. 4 and Aug. 23, they will play 14 games against the Dodgers, Arizona Diamondbacks and Miami Marlins. The Padres are nine games back of the Dodgers in the NL West, but a wild-card berth isn't out of reach. They'd need to leapfrog Arizona, Miami and the Chicago Cubs to earn a wild card.