It wasn’t that long ago that San Diego Padres left-hander Eric Stults started against his former team. On Sept. 4 of last year, Stults limited the Dodgers to seven hits and one run in six innings at Dodger Stadium. The Dodgers wound up losing that game 6-3 in 11 innings when John Ely imploded (the first time) in his first major-league game of the season.

Afterward Dodgers manager Don Mattingly said he’d seen enough soft-tossing left-handers for a season. “We’re kind of seeing the same guy and not making enough adjustments,” he said. Turns out that the Dodgers weren’t alone in their misery facing Stults, who went 3-1 over his final four starts of last year, including two wins over the eventual World Series champion San Francisco Giants. Stults shut out the Mets for five innings to win his only start of 2013. For a guy who was relegated to Japan after being cut by the Dodgers in 2009, it’s a nice little comeback.

Stults will be opposed by Chad Billingsley, who was officially activated from the 15-day disabled list prior to the game. Interesting to note that both pitchers broke into the majors with the Dodgers in the same year (2006). Billingsley would start 100 games over the next four seasons for the Dodgers. Stults started 24 during that same span before the teams parted ways.

Don’t forget, the game will not be on Prime Ticket tonight but you can still watch it on local cable.

Here are tonight’s full lineups:

Dodgers:
Crawford LF
M Ellis 2B
Kemp CF
Gonzalez 1B
Ethier RF
Cruz 3B
AJ Ellis C
Sellers SS
Billingsley P

Padres:
Cabrera SS
Venable RF
Denorfia LF
Alonso 1B
Gyorko 3B
Amarista 2B
Maybin CF
Hundley C
Stults P

One more game of note today: Ted Lilly is expected to make a rehab start for Triple-A Albuquerque against Omaha after allowing five runs (four earned) on nine hits in 6 innings (77 pitches) on Friday for Single-A Rancho Cucamonga. The game begins at 6 p.m. PST.