Padres need starting pitching

In the immediacy, let’s hope the Padres do not allow Barry Bonds to break the Major League Baseball home run record in San Diego this weekend.

But there’s suddenly an even bigger issue with Padres’ pitching.

Jake Peavy is finally back on track, but:

Chris Young is injured.
Greg Maddux can’t go past five or six innings, even when he’s on.
David Wells is getting paid $170,000 (on top of his $3 million base salary) each start to get pummeled.
Justin Germano isn’t fooling anyone any more with his hanging breaking ball.

Enter Clay Hensley. The injury-plagued pitcher has had a terrible 2007 season thus far, but he seems to have regained his form in a pair of three-inning relief stints since being recalled from the minors.

Let’s see how he does in Saturday’s start against the San Francisco Giants.

Luckily for the Padres, the Dodgers and Arizona are not deep in starting pitching either.

So, it may all come down to a battle of attrition in the NL West.