Anthony Rizzo admits he is “anxious” to reach the major leagues.

From www.signonsandiego.com (share this quote)

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Position players tend to have fewer hurdles to clear from some of the injuries, like Tommy John surgery, that often knock pitchers out for a year or even two, so I’d expect Blanks to be on a quicker timetable back than most pitchers would be.

You can only hope that the elbow problems a) will be properly and permanently fixed and b) were at the core of Blanks’ 2010 struggles, where he struck out nearly every other at-bat and couldn’t break the Mendoza Line.

It’s worth noting that Blanks’ uncertain status could keep Adrian Gonzalez in a Padres uniform longer than initially expected. Blanks was expected to succeed Gonzalez at first base once the Padres star was traded, but now, there’s no clear candidate to replace Gonzalez, and if Blanks has rehab setbacks, he may be out until after next year’s trade deadline. The Padres’ three other in-house options to replace Gonzalez would be AAA players Mike Baxter and Kyle Phillips and Double-A first baseman Matt Clark.

Best of luck to Blanks on his surgery and recovery; hopefully, when he finally comes back, he’s in 2009 form or better.

You wouldn’t know it from their game against 48-54 Las Vegas Sunday night, as they absolutely destroyed the 51′s by a whopping 21-4 score.

What gets me isn’t so much the 21 runs–it happens–but the 32 hits the Beavers put up.

32 hits! The team went 32-for-57 (they hit into two double plays)! That’s a .561 average!

If that’s not enough, consider that every player in the lineup except Lance Zawadzki got three or more hits.

Cedric Hunter was 4-for-7. Craig Stansberry was 4-for-6. Mike Baxter went 4-for-7. Kyle Phillips and Wily Mo Pena were both 5-for-6 with a walk. That’s right, the first five hitters in the Beavers lineup had at least four hits each.

From there, Nick Green was 3-for-7, Zawadzki 1-for-6, Chris Stewart 3-for-6, and Luis Durango 3-for-5 with a walk.

Stewart hit the club’s only home run.

Through it all, Cory Luebke threw eight superb innings, allowing two runs on five hits and two walks while striking out eight. The usual Aaron Poreda walk-fest occurred in the ninth and brought the score from 21-2 to 21-4, but if there was ever a game to pitch Poreda in, this was it.

It’s great to see the bats wake up in this sort of huge way, and perhaps even better to see Luebke (2.57 ERA in three starts) finally giving the Padres a reliable Triple-A arm.