Good morning,
The Padres appear to be in a good place again.
They are a victory away from winning a second consecutive series against a team that arrived at Petco Park with the best record in the major leagues.
They knocked the Braves from the top perch with a sweep earlier this week, and they could do the same to the Dodgers.
That is nice for them. They just needed wins after a May malaise had threatened to become a June swoon.
Not to make too much of the standings with half the season (plus one game) remaining, but the Padres are back in playoff position. They are also six games over .500 for the first time since May 31.
My game story (here) from last night’s 7-1 victory focused on another Walker Buehler outing that was magnificent while it lasted and another big blast by Ty France.
We will talk more about both of those things.
First, let’s discuss the facet of the team most responsible for turning the Padres back in the right direction. Because last night was indicative of what they have done so much more lately and also illustrative of how they could be better.
The Padres had seven hits, walked nine times and had one batter hit last night. It was the 15th time in 17 games they reached base at least 11 times, which is something they had done just 11 times in the 35 games before this stretch.
Last night was just the third time this season the Padres had more walks (nine) than strikeouts (four). The only other games they accomplished that were April 11 and 12 against the Rockies.
The Padres also went 4-for-10 with runners in scoring position, the sixth time in eight games they reached double digits in opportunities with men on second and/or third base.
Three of those four hits came in succession in their four-run eighth inning. They had been 1-for-7 to that point. They twice led off an inning with a double and had that inning end with the bases loaded and without scoring.
“You’re not always going to come through in every opportunity,” manager Craig Stammen said. “But the more opportunities we give ourselves, the better chance we have of breaking through. And we did that in the last inning tonight. I love the at-bats that we’re taking, I love us getting a lot of people on the bases. We’ve just got to do a little bit better with those leadoff doubles. We’ve got to figure out a way to get that guy to third and get them in. But eventually, we get enough people on base, we’re going to score some runs.”
The merit in what he says is obvious.
The Padres’ four-run eighth inning was their eighth time scoring at least three runs in an inning over their past 16 games. They had done so once in the previous 18 games.
The difference between then and now is primarily that they have given themselves twice as many opportunities per game to drive in runners.
Two times, and then …
It might have been jarring to see Stammen emerge from the dugout with one out in the sixth inning to remove Buehler after just 74 pitches.
But it should not have been a shock.
Once Buehler got out of the moment, he knew why.
“I understand this one,” Buehler said. “Freddie has hit a ball about 130 mph off me before. He has handled me pretty good in the past, so bring in the lefty and see what happens. And obviously Yuki (Matsui) did a great job to get us out of it, and then the rest of the bullpen did what they did.”
Freeman was 5-for-20 with two home runs against Buehler, including the postseason, entering last night’s game. One of the home runs was hit at 111 mph.
So Buehler may have been overstating the argument. But the fact is Freeman and Mookie Betts were due up, and Buehler was at a point in the game where he has struggled against far less formidable hitters than those two.
Buehler is better than league average his first two times through an opponents’ batting order and far worse the third time.
He began last night’s sixth inning by going 3-0 to Shohei Ohtani before getting a groundout on a 3-2 slider that he probably was fortunate Ohtani didn’t hit harder somewhere else.
He then walked Andy Pages on four pitches, only one of them close.
“That’s kind of like how we’ve seen him pitch a little bit,” Stammen said. “He’s going really good, really good, really good, and then he has a, ‘I’m a little older guy right now, I need to be taken out’ (moment). So trying to find that right time as the manager to do it with him but also give him a leash to get us as many innings as he can.”
Buehler , who will turn 32 a month from tomorrow, finished June with a 1.71 ERA in five starts. He allowed one run in each of those games with a high of six innings and a low of 4⅔ innings. He went five innings once and 5⅓ twice.
He has by far been the Padres’ most dependable pitcher. They have won 11 of his 16 starts, and maybe if they had come through with another run or two before the sixth inning, he could have faced Freeman.
But this is pretty much who Buehler is.
That doesn’t mean he can’t be more. It doesn’t mean he does not want to be more.
But he has gone six innings just three times while posting a 3.28 ERA over his past 14 starts.
“Obviously, it’s a talented team over there,” Buehler said. “It’s a struggle to get them out the third time through. You come up with all these plans and things you want to do, and sometimes when it kind of works out that way, then you don’t really know what to do the third time through. I think I’ve kind of changed from trying to throw 120 pitches and all that and owning the game to just kind of trying to get through the five, six innings and hand it off to our bullpen. And obviously we have a lot of super-talented guys back there. So yeah, I feel good about it.”
Buehler v. Dodgers
People in the Padres organization essentially shrugged this week when it was mentioned to them that Buehler might be pretty amped to face the Dodgers, the team that drafted him and for which he pitched from 2017 through 2025. Their point was that Buehler probably couldn’t be much more intense than he is every time he takes the mound.
It was a fair point, and it turned out they were right.
“I think the first one in Boston was a lot bigger emotional kind of load, for lack of a better word,” he said referring to his start for the Red Sox against his former team last season. “It’s a team in our division. I’m going to have to pitch against them. It was good to get the first one in this uniform at home. We’ll see what happens on the road. I haven’t thrown at Dodger Stadium yet, which will be kind of a different thing. But nice to have kind of something to fall back on a little bit in terms of having some success.”
It remains to be seen whether Buehler pitches at Dodger Stadium next week. His turn in the rotation comes up again Wednesday in Chicago. But the Padres have plenty of options to tweak the rotation.
They initially had Buehler scheduled to start tonight with the idea he would face the Dodgers twice. Then they pushed Randy Vásquez back to tonight, and Stammen indicated Buehler would face the Cubs.
Buehler noted how different the Dodgers roster is from much of his time there.
”I was kind of the young guy over there for a long time, and then was hurt kind of in my last couple years and not as successful,” he said. “So a lot of the guys over there are not the guys that I kind of came up around all the time — the Justin Turners and Chase Utleys and guys like that. So it is a thing. I spent a lot of time in Los Angeles, but I don’t think it’s kind of quite the same as maybe somebody that came up with everybody and then played against the same team.”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said before the game that he anticipated Buehler wanting to do well against the Dodgers.
“Listen, I have no bad blood against that organization,” Buehler said afterward. “They treated me very well for a long time, and I think in some way I did to them as well. My last pitch there was the last out of a World Series. I don’t really know how else I would have gone out any better than that. And so, yeah, I want to kick everyone’s ass. I want to beat everyone, especially in the division and especially a team that has been so successful against the organization I’m with now. I want to be a part of turning that around, and I certainly don’t want to lose to them So, you know, Doc is not wrong.”
Matsui steals show
On a night that Roki Sasaki started and Shohei Ohtani was playing, Matsui ended up being one of the game’s stars for what he did in leaving the bases loaded in the sixth inning.
Matsui laughed at the notion of his shining when dozens of Japanese media members were in attendance.
“They are here for the Dodgers, and I’m just kind of additional,” he said through interpreter Ike Ogata.
He was not a spare part for the Padres.
The left-hander was the pitcher Stammen called on to face Freeman with one out and one on.
Freeman hit a fly ball that fell to the ground in the left field corner just beyond the reach of Samad Taylor for a double. The Padres then intentionally walked Betts to load the bases.
Matsui ended the inning on Max Muncy’s pop fly in the infield and Kyle Tucker’s fly ball that was caught by center fielder Jackson Merrill.
“To be able to pitch in a situation like this and get the results, (to) keep executing pitches, as a relief pitcher, that’s what you strive for,” Matsui said. “Ultimately, that’s the entire reason to compete at this level in these situations. That’s the reason I came over here from Japan. So that’s an honor and excites me to be put in that situation, to be trusted.”
Matsui has had some big moments keeping deficits where they were to help the Padres come back and entered the game with a 1.67 ERA in 18 appearances. But last night was the first time this season he has pitched that late in a game the Padres led by fewer than four runs.
“He has been just nails,” Stammen said. “We had him in kind of a long relief, low-leverage role, and he’s worked his way into facing 3-4-5-6 for the Dodgers.”
France stays hot, gets hurt
France made it almost all the way through the game after a 99 mph fastball from Sasaki rode up and hit him on the left wrist in the fourth inning.
But he appeared to aggravate the injury by using his left hand for balance when popping up after a slide into third base in the eighth inning, and he was replaced at first base by Miguel Andujar in the ninth.
“He was feeling a little tender in that area,” Stammen said. “We’ll have to evaluate him tonight, get X-rays. He was able to take at-bats after he got hit, was able to play defense. There was nothing going on. I think he just kind of jammed it sliding into the base.”
The Padres will hope for the best, because now is not the time to lose France.
Ever since those 600 or so pregame swings in Texas last week, he is back to being one of the team’s most productive hitters.
His home run in the second inning last night gave the Padres a 3-1 lead. It was his 10th homer of the season, three more than he had in 2025 in 2½ times as many plate appearances.
France is 7-for-22 with two doubles, four homers and 10 RBIs in his past seven games. This follows a 3-for-33 stretch in which his season average fell from .291 to .259 and his OPS fell from .858 to .728. All four of his recent homers have given the Padres a lead or tied game.
France was still being evaluated late last night and was unavailable to the media in the clubhouse, but he did talk on the field to Sammy Levitt of the team’s flagship radio station (97.3-FM).
“Swinging at the right pitches,” France said of the difference lately. “My swing this month hasn’t felt the greatest. But overall this year, I feel like my old self again.”
Waiting on Crone
Jake Cronenworth homered in the first at-bat of his rehab start and later doubled Friday night playing for Triple-A El Paso.
It is up to Cronenworth to demonstrate when he is ready to return.
“Hopefully, he shows that he’s in good shape and hits well, and we can call him back up and get him playing second base for us,” Stammen said yesterday afternoon.
But, as indicated by his being removed after seven innings last night, the Padres are likely to take it somewhat slow with Cronenworth, who suffered a concussion in mid-April and last played in a major league game on May 4.
“I think he’s gonna give us a little bit of indication of, ‘Yeah, I feel ready, my timing is back,’” Stammen said yesterday afternoon. “It’s a little bit almost like spring training, where we’ve got to just more so — not like health-wise but just like baseball-wise — am I ready to play baseball? Am I ready to play every day when I get back?”
That said, the Padres are anxious to get Cronenworth back. The assumption is his poor start at the plate was furthered by the fact he played concussed for 11 games before reporting his symptoms to the team.
Cronenworth is batting .144 with a .468 OPS in 114 plate appearances. He had one hit in his final 19 at-bats before going on the concussion IL. He said at that time that he had been having difficulty with depth perception and focus.
Cronenworth reached base last season at a career-high .367 clip and has his highest batting average (.244) and OPS (.744) since 2021.
“We’ve been missing that left-handed bat in our lineup that gives that professional at-bat, works the pitcher, has the opportunity for some slug, plays great defense,” Stammen said. “He just does all the little things on the field that you kind of miss and don’t really get recognized in the box score. But over the course of time, you’re like, ‘Man, we really miss a player like Jake.’ We’ve missed him this entire time, and it’ll be awesome to have him back.”
Tidbits
Fernando Tatis Jr. was 2-for-5 with a double last night and is batting .329/.372/.506 during his 19-game on-base streak. His .358 batting average over his past 29 games is fourth highest in MLB since May 24.
Manny Machado’s double in the fourth inning was his 11th extra-base hit (eight doubles, three home runs) in his past 15 games. He had nine extra-base hits (two doubles, seven home runs) in his previous 36 games.
Machado also walked twice and is batting .268/.364/.571 while reaching base in 13 of his past 15 games. He is, however, back to having the lowest batting average (.186) among 156 qualifying batters.
Oh, and Machado challenged another pitch that was well within the strike zone. He is now 5-for-13 on ABS challenges. That 38% success ranks 55th among the 74 batters who have challenged at least 10 calls.
Merrill was 0-for-4 last night and has one hit in 15 at-bats in his past four games. He had hit .300 (15-for-50) with three doubles, a triple and two home runs over his previous 11 games.
Merrill did reach on a fielder’s choice and steal his 16th base (in 17 attempts). That ties his career high set in his rookie season of 2024.
Will Wagner walked twice last night and has a .450 on-base percentage in his 40 plate appearances since being recalled on June 9. He did not swing at any of the eight pitches he saw outside the strike zone last night and is chasing at a 22.4% rate for the season.
Samad Taylor (0-for-3) went without a hit for just the second time in his 16 starts. He did walk twice and has a .448 OBP in his starts.
Please read Annie Heilbrunn’s story (here) on the uncertainty of coming back from Tommy John surgery. It is an enlightening look at the reality of a surgery that many fans have come to assume is routine.
For a lighter read, check out Jeff Sanders’ latest “Clubhouse Chatter” (here) to see which baseball movies Padres players prefer. (None of them picked correctly, by the way, since none of them chose “A League of Their Own.”)
And Tom Krasovic gets some help from Joe Musgrove (here) recalling the Padres’ courtship of Sasaki, who they faced for the first time and beat last night.
The Padres have a positive run differential for the first time since May 29. (They have scored 316 runs to their opponents’ 315.)
All right, that’s it for me.
Talk to you tomorrow.