Friar talk: Alexei Ramirez's power surge

The Padres' Alexei Ramirez holds his arms out as he enters the dugout after he hit a two-run home run in the sixth inning.For the second year in a row, Alexei Ramirez opened the season in a power drought, his 185 plate appearances without a homer the longest outage of his career to start a season.

Somewhere along the line, the Padres’ coaching staff noticed something about Ramirez.

“He's always been a head-out hitter who has predominantly hit to the pull side throughout his career,” Padres manager Andy Green said. “As we looked and watched the first part of the season, he was working hard to stay inside the baseball and use the whole field, there was some encouragement given to him last week…