Padres Fans Rip Apart Austin Nola & Bob Melvin After Saturday's Loss

Some questionable late-game decisions by Bo Mel.

Everything was poised on Saturday morning/afternoon for the San Diego Padres to take yet another game from the New York Yankees in their first series of 2023. Superstar Aaron Judge was held to just one hit and even though the Friars couldn't generate a ton of offense, Michael Wacha put together a solid seven innings at the mound.

Fernando Tatis Jr. even received louder boos than he did on Friday and responded to the crowd once again with a 426 ft home run in the fourth inning.

Tatis ties it up 💪#BringTheGold pic.twitter.com/7NXdgbGlJi

— San Diego Padres (@Padres) May 27, 2023

However, the game was 2-2 by the bottom of the seventh inning and had to go extra innings once nobody else scored. This when Bob Melvin decided to go against the script and allow Austin Nola, who is batting .134 and has an OPS of .443 in 2023, to pinch hit and try to help them win the game.

Nola has been struggling for San Diego all year and what was the result of this decision? A relatively easy out for the Yankees en route to their 3-2 win.

Padres fans let Melvin and Nola have it on Twitter after the game... let's see what they had to say.

Having Nola pinch hit for anyone should get the manager fired.

— PLnole34 (@plfriar1) May 27, 2023

BoMel needs to answer why Grisham and Nola are in the game. Both are unplayable at this point

— Aztec88 (@AztecsPads) May 27, 2023

A lot has been invested into Austin Nola and he had a good reputation with the franchise after coming up huge in last year's playoffs. Many thought he would find himself again after Luis Campusano went down with injury but that has yet to happen.

Creator of The Hog Watch, Borna Nazari, brought up some great points about why Nola is still being given opportunities but also spoke on the harsh reality that is his future.

The Austin Nola experiment should’ve been over weeks ago…. pic.twitter.com/lNhBwDf2vh

— Borna Nazari (@thehogwatch) May 27, 2023

There was certainly a lot to unpack here, especially for Melvin who has been critical of the team's production as of late. One last game against the Yankees tomorrow at 10:35 am PT.