I’ll be honest, the San Diego Padres-Florida Marlins matchup probably isn’t the best series of the early week in baseball, but it’s high time we write about the Padres here at Doc’s Sports as they are easily the biggest surprise in the majors so far. We offer some series predictions at the end of this article.

Entering Monday’s series opener in South Florida – the Marlins are -170 series favorites on BetUS – the Fathers lead the NL West at 11-7. They do actually enter off a loss, as the Reds beat the Padres, 5-4, on Sunday to end San Diego’s eight-game winning streak and stop the team from sweeping its third series in a row.

But even Cincy manager Dusty Baker was impressed by what he saw over the weekend.

"They capitalize on your mistakes,” he said. “The past couple years, we've seemed to catch them when they're hot. Now it's our turn to get hot."

But are the Pads for real? I highly doubt it. Let’s not forget where this team ended up last year despite having a 10-game winning streak in May 2009 (although they did go 37-25 in the final 62 games).

“The experts think we got a few lucky wins and now we’re going to keel over and die,” Chase Headley said after Sunday’s loss -- Headley (.371, six steals) has been tremendous this year, by the way.

Adrian Gonzalez remains a stud, and he has four homers in the past four days. But it’s still probably more likely than not that he is traded around the deadline unless by some miracle the team is still in the race. And foes simply aren’t going to continue to let Gonzalez beat them. San Diego is running well to make up for a lack of offense, currently leading the NL with 20 steals.

The pitching staff has been the biggest reason for San Diego’s success, especially the bullpen (Sunday’s loss was the first for a reliever this season). The Padres are third in the majors in team ERA and second in opponent’s batting average. And that’s despite the fact that “ace” Chris Young has pitched all of six innings so far this season. Guys like Jon Garland, Kevin Correia and Mat Latos have been more than solid.

Latos (1-1, 3.57), who held the Giants to just four hits in seven scoreless innings last time out, gets the start in Game 1 against Florida and ace Josh Johnson (1-1, 4.09). In his lone career start against Florida in 2009, Latos went just 3 1/3 innings, allowing four earned runs and taking the loss. Johnson hasn’t allowed an earned run in seven career innings against the Padres, and thus the Fish are -160 favorites for the opener. San Diego has missed the opposition’s No. 1 starter in the past three series.

Florida returns home off a 4-5 road trip. The Marlins are just a game-and-a-half behind the Phillies despite a relatively slow start for Hanley Ramirez (.288, one homer, six RBI). He is just 4-for-22 with an RBI in the past six games. And reigning NL Rookie of the Year Chris Coghlan would have to crane his neck just to see the Mendoza line, as he is batting .154 (hit .321 in 2009). Marlins outfielder Cameron Maybin missed the past two games after a collision with a teammate in Game 1 of Saturday’s doubleheader with the Rockies but should be able to play tonight.

Here are the other probable pitchers for this series:

Tuesday – Padres RHP Garland (1-2, 2.86) vs. Marlins RHP Anibal Sanchez (1-1, 4.82)
Wednesday – Padres RHP Correia (3-1, 3.13) vs. Marlins LHP Nate Robertson (2-1, 3.98)

Because of Saturday’s doubleheader, Robertson will be pitching on only three days’ rest. He lasted four innings against the Rockies on that day and took the loss. Just one of his four starts has lasted longer than five innings this season. But I expect the Marlins to be going for the sweep on Wednesday.

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