SEATTLE — The Padres lost to the most consistent starting pitcher in the major leagues.

And they continued to get mixed results from their own starting pitchers.

The Mariners beat the Padres 4-3 on Wednesday in the finale of a three-game series to continue their recent domination of the interleague “rivalry.”

The Padres actually had their best game among the three times they have faced Bryan Woo and were the first team in his 26 starts this season to get him out of a game before the sixth inning ended.

But two runs in the sixth inning against Woo and a run in the ninth against closer Andres Muñoz left them a run short, as they lost to the Mariners for the fifth time in six games this season and 14th time in 18 games since the start of 2022.

The far more pertinent issue — barring the Vedder Cup foes meeting in the World Series — is the Padres’ rotation riding a rollercoaster.

For the third consecutive game, Padres manager Mike Shildt was into his bullpen before the fifth inning was over.

This time, he took out Yu Darvish before the fifth began.

This run of short starts comes after the Padres got five quality starts over a six-game stretch last week. And that followed a series in Los Angeles where they went with a bullpen game in the opener (after Michael King was placed on the injured list) and got a total of 7⅓ innings from Dylan Cease and Darvish the next two days.

On Wednesday, Darvish was coming off arguably his best start among the nine he had made since starting the season late due to an elbow issue. He had on Friday allowed the Dodgers a solo home run and no other baserunners over six innings.

But his yielding four runs in four innings Wednesday continued a trend of alternating excellent starts with ones that are not.

After shutting out the Mets over seven innings on July 30, Darvish surrendered three runs in four innings against the Diamondbacks on Aug. 5. The Giants scored once against him in six innings in his next start, on Aug. 11, before he allowed the Dodgers three runs in four innings on Aug. 17. Then came the rebound against the Dodgers last week.

He entered Wednesday with a 1.04 ERA in four starts against the Mariners since he joined the Padres in 2021.

Eugenio Suarez was the catalyst for changing that.

In the second inning, Suarez lined a one-out single softly to left field, stole second and scored when Luke Raley drove a full-count curveball to the gap in right-center field with two outs.

And after Julio Rodriguez singled and Josh Naylor walked to start the fourth, Suarez launched a home run over the left field wall to give the Mariners their 4-0 advantage.

From there, it was mostly a familiar path for the Padres.

Unlike Monday’s 9-6 defeat, Wednesday went down more like how they have usually lost to the Mariners over the past four seasons.

That is to say: they were held down by an excellent pitcher.

The 25-year-old Woo lowered his ERA slightly to 2.90 and saw his WHIP inflate a hundredth of a point to 0.95.

The Mariners taking two of three this week followed their sweep at Petco Park in May in which the Padres scored a total of three runs.

One of those games was started by Woo, who allowed a run over seven innings.

His only other start against the Padres had come here last September. That night, he took a no-hitter into the seventh inning before Fernando Tatis Jr. hit a home run and the Padres ended up scoring two runs before Woo departed with two outs.

Wednesday, the Padres had three singles and a walk in the first five innings before scoring twice in the sixth.

The second run would score after Woo left loaded bases to reliever Gabe Speier, who promptly hit Jake Cronenworth.

With six singles and a walk, the Padres had two more baserunners Wednesday than in either of the first two starts Woo made against them.

Doubles by Jake Cronenworth and Fernando Tatis Jr. got the Padres to within a run in the ninth before Ramon Laureano grounded out to end the game.

Originally Published: August 27, 2025 at 3:56 PM PDT