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After sweeping the pesky but anything but imposing Washington Nationals at home earlier in the week, the Dodgers have found things a little tougher against one of the league's big dogs.  In San Diego against the red-hot Padres, the Dodgers have dropped two in a row including a 7-0 blowout on Saturday night.

SATURDAY's DIFFERENCE MAKERS

3) Adrian Gonzalez- Gonzalez' second inning homer off of Derek Lowe staked the Padres to a 1-0 lead.  The blast was his career high 25th of the year.  Gonzalez also had a single in the Padres' six run fifth inning that chased Dodger starter Derek Lowe.

2) Mike Cameron- The speedy centerfielder hit a game-changing grand slam in the fifth and made a fantastic catch to rob Andre Ethier of a hit in the sixth.  The slam was the fifth of Cameron's career, but the first since April 22, 2003 when he had a walk-off grand slam for Seattle against Cleveland.

1) Jake Peavy-  Peavy was dominant and in control throughout the entire game, surrendering only a single and a double (both to Juan Pierre) in seven innings.  Peavy fanned nine as he picked up his career high 16th win of the year.  He's won his last seven decisions.

AROUND THE HORN

The Dodgers have dropped five straight games at Petco Park and six out of eight there this year.

Shortsto Chin-lung Hu and reliever Jonathan Meloan made their Major League debuts in the rout. Hu grounded out in his only at bat.  Meloan threw two scoreless innings, but did struggle in his second inning when he walked the bases loaded before getting out of the jam on a pop up.

Six of the seven runs charged to Derek Lowe were earned, but a key throwing error by Shea Hillenbrand certainly opened the flood gates in the Padres' fifth. With men on first and third and Peavy at the plate, Hillenbrand threw away a chance to get the second out of the inning, permitted a run to score and allowed runners to end up at second and third.  After an intentional walk to Brian Giles, Cameron hit his slam to put the game away.  

Dodger hopes to avoid a sweep rest on the arm of Chad Billingsley, who is 2-1 with a 3.00 ERA in his career against the Padres.  He's fanned 29 Padres in 24 innings pitched, and has not allowed a homer to a San Diego batter.  Cameron is 1 for 12 against Billingsley with four strikeouts, and Brian Giles is 1 for 8 with three strikeouts.  Adrian Gonzalez (4 for 11 with a double) and Josh Bard (3 for 4 with a double) have fared better against the Dodger righty.

San Diego's Sunday starter, Justin Germano, has had an up and down second half of the season.  He was awful in July, going 1-5 with a 7.24 ERA and seven homers allowed in 32 1/3 innings pitched.  He got things together somewhat in August, going 1-1 with a 3.86 ERA and no homers allowed in 28 innings pitched.  Germano has fared better against lefthanded hitters (.212 avg, .278 opb,, .332 slugging pct) than righties (.274/.336/.422) so far this year.  He's also done better on the road (4-2, 3.24) than at Petco (3-5, 5.30). 

Sunday's game will be played in the San Diego sun.  Who have been the Dodgers' best hitters in day games this year?  Luis Gonzalez has the most homers with six, with Russell Martin hitting five.  Jeff Kent's 21 RBI lead the team, with Martin and Andre Ethier next with 16 each.  Matt Kemp's .417 batting average leads the team. Ethier has hit .323 in day games this year.  Kemp also leads in OPS with a superb 1.062 mark, with Ethier (.976) and Kent (.891) next in line.

DODGER FLASHBACK

On Sunday September 2, 1979 as the Dodgers headed into the bottom of the ninth trailing the Cubs by a 2-1 score, the opera wasn't over but the fat lady was certainly warming up her pipes.  You see, the Dodgers were going up against Cubs' closer and eventual 1979 Cy Young Award winner Bruce Sutter and ninth inning leads in Sutter's hands were about as safe as they could be. On this day, however, things would be different.

Ron Cey started the Dodgers off in the ninth with a walk, and moved to second on Dusty Baker's sacrifice bunt.  Bill Russell's single moved Cey to third, and the Dodger third baseman then scored the tying run on Gary Thomasson's RBI single.  A Steve Yeager single loaded the bases, but Sutter appeared on the verge of at least getting the game to extra innings when he struck out Joe Ferguson.  One swing of Dodger leadoff man Davey Lopes' bat changed that, as Lopes drove a Sutter pitch over the wall for a game ending grand slam that gave the Dodgers a 6-2 win.

Lopes' walk-off homer was his second of the year.  On April 8th, he hit a solo blast in the 12th inning to beat the Padres.  The walk-off slam was also not something new  to Lopes.  in July of 1978, Lopes did the same thing, this time to beat the Atlanta Braves.