Good morning,
The Padres are not worried.
“We’re in a good position to go where we want to go,” Jake Cronenworth said.
And Mike Shildt, who would have given his life jacket to another person on the Titanic both because he thought it was the right thing to do and because there just was no way that ship was going down, spent a good portion of his postgame news conference smiling.
“I can’t be more excited about this team,” he said. “I just can’t. And the opportunities we have.”
It is true that it is all right there for them.
No one should say the Padres have hit an iceberg. In fact, they are not hitting much these days. (More about that later.)
You can read in Jeff Sanders’ game story (here) how a 4-2 deafet to the Rockies came about.
The loss to the worst team in baseball — and against a starting pitcher the Padres crushed five days earlier — was even more excruciating than it sounds.
And it got worse when the Dodgers lost to the Giants about an hour later, meaning the Padres could have moved to within 1½ games of the National League West leaders.
Yesterday was the fifth time in their past 14 games the Padres have lost on the same day the Dodgers lost.
They are more likely at this point to rue not winning the division than not making the postseason.
The Padres sit in the fifth of six NL playoff spots, four games up on the Mets, who hold the NL’s final wild-card spot. The Mets have lost seven straight and are now just a half-game ahead of the Giants and 1½ games up on the Reds.
It has been 11 years since a team with a 4½-game cushion with 14 games remaining did not make the postseason.
And the Padres do hold the tiebreaker over the Giants after winning the season series.
So the Padres are still in a good position to accomplish their goals.
FanGraphs lists the probability they make the postseason at 98.7%.
But they have to start winning.
And Shildt believes he has identified an issue.
“These guys, they want it so bad,” Shildt said. “They are so … dedicated in their preparation. And man, they want it bad. And, you know, I’d like for them to let the game come to them a little bit more. You can feel everybody in the atmosphere is wanting it really badly. But, you know, just easier said than done.”
That was a response to a question about the offense. And asked later to clarify, Shildt brought it back to the offense.
”The one thing that I would like to appreciate is the fact how much they care and how hard they’re going at it,” he said. “And it’s a challenging game, and I just want them to continue to get back and create an atmosphere here where we can just enjoy it a little bit more. And, you know, it’s chicken egg proposition, right? You want to have the success. But I have the privilege of seeing every day how this group comes in, how they prepare, how they’re dedicated. … It’s outstanding. And it’s just a matter of continuing to stay in the fight and having consistent at-bats. But we’re in a good spot, and I get the privilege of being able to see it, and I’m excited about it.”
For the record, Cronenworth and Ryan O’Hearn said later that they did not think the Padres were holding on too tight to the bat handles.
“I don’t think we’re pressing,” Cronenworth said.
“The demeanor is fine,” O’Hearn said. “Guys show up and compete. Some big hits would be good. It’s baseball. That’s how it goes. Any team can get you on any day.”
Can’t stack ‘em
Again, the Padres’ opponent showed what can happen when you hit the ball over the wall more than once a game or with anyone on base.
Padres starting pitcher JP Sears, filling in as the team maneuvered the rotation to give its five regular starters extra rest, struck out seven of the 10 batters he faced in the first three innings.
Two singles began the fourth inning. Then came a sacrifice bunt and Sears’ eighth strikeout.
Two pitches later, the Padres trailed 4-1.
Blaine Crim’s first MLB hit was a three-run homer on the first pitch he saw from Sears. And Kyle Farmer jumped on the next pitch for a solo home run.
We have discussed the Padres’ lack of slug over and over. And the reality is they are almost certainly not going to suddenly become the Park Boulevard Bombers.
They are who they are, and they are best served continuing to be that team at this point.
“It’s just the consistency of the quality of the at-bat throughout and continuing to do what the game calls for,” Shildt said. “That’s easier said than done some days, but that really is what’s going to happen. This offense is too talented not to put something together more consistently, and we’ll do that.”
The problem with the type of offense the Padres have is that it leaves them vulnerable to what happened last night and has happened quite a bit lately.
Manny Machado actually gave the Padres a 1-0 lead with a home run in the first inning. But the Padres did not reach base again against Rockies starter Tanner Gordon until the seventh inning.
“We were collectively late on that guy’s fastball for the first half of the game for whatever reason,” O’Hearn said.
Gordon has shut down some good teams this season, and he held the Padres to a run in six innings last August at Petco Park. But he entered yesterday’s game with a 6.60 ERA in 12 starts this season and five days earlier at Coors Field surrendered six runs in 3⅔ innings against the Padres.
“The shape of his pitches are obviously different here than Colorado,” Cronenworth said. “We just need to do a better job of making in-game adjustments.”
A single by Arraez and a walk by Machado at the start of the seventh inning ran Gordon from the game. But three consecutive outs followed against reliever Juan Mejia.
That was the beginning of three consecutive initially promising but ultimately telling innings.
A single by O’Hearn and a walk by Cronenworth began the eighth inning before Jimmy Herget replaced Mejia and got a double play grounder by Will Wagner and struck out Fernando Tatis Jr.
With Victor Vodnik on the mound, a one-out single by Machado in the ninth was followed by Gavin Sheets’ double. Ramón Laureano got Machado home and Sheets to third on a groundout, and a walk by Merrill brought O’Hearn to the plate as the potential tying run.
A four-pitch strikeout ended the game.
The problem with a virtually slugless offense is that it must rely on stacking quality at-bats in order to score. Against the modern pitcher, that is less likely than ever.
It wasn’t that long ago that the Padres were doing a pretty good job of it.
The three runs they needed to tie the game last night? They scored at least three runs in 13 different innings over 28 games in August. They have done it five times in 11 games in September, but three of those came at Coors Field.
“In the past, we’ve seen it where the really good innings we have, it’s quality at-bat, quality at-bat, quality at-bat, five or six in the same inning,” Cronenworth said. “And it’s those big innings where we score four or five runs. It seems like that’s just not going right now.”
Outside of their 18 runs and 31 hits in victories at Coors Field last weekend, the Padres are averaging 2.3 runs and 5.8 hits over their other nine games this month.
That is a shame, because their pitching staff actually has a lower ERA this month (3.55) than it had the season’s first five months (3.63).
Ron Marinaccio replaced Sears with one out in the fifth and threw a career-high three innings before Wandy Peralta went the rest of the way.
“That was fantastic,” Shildt said. “We give up four runs, and good job by both those guys to keep it there. Give us a chance. Give us a swing to tie it.”
A swing. If only.
Machado’s night
Machado may be tired, but he is not letting up on the work.
No, he has taken the tack of trying to swing his way out of his slump.
Machado took multiple weeks’ worth of swings yesterday afternoon, his third day in a row of an extended early batting practice session on the field with hitting coach Victor Rodriguez.
“It’s the only way to do it,” Rodriguez said afterward.
Machado declined to talk about his extra work with one of the funniest things he has ever said to me. (It wouldn’t be as funny in the retelling, so we’ll just keep that on the downlow for now. But he is a funny dude.) He also was gone by the time the media got to the clubhouse after the game.
His bat said that the work is perhaps paying off.
As noted above, he homered, singled and walked. That broke a string of four games in which he did not reach base and made him 4-for-32 (.125) over the past eight games.
Bogaerts update
Xander Bogaerts spent nearly an hour on the field yesterday afternoon, fielding grounders and making throws from shortstop and then taking batting practice for the first time since suffering a fracture in his left foot on Aug. 27.
“I could probably play now, but only hitting,” Bogaerts said afterward.
Since the Padres have an abundance of designated hitters, Bogaerts will return when he is ready to play nine innings daily at shortstop.
“I know I gotta come back and go in the field,” he said with a laugh.
There is more discomfort than pain when he works defensively. And there is some tentativeness.
“I think there is a lot to do with the mind,” he said, “Putting force against (the foot) to throw or not, I think that gets in your head.”
Bogaerts said from the time he went on the IL he would return during the regular season, and that certainly seems likely given that there are two weeks remaining. He said he considers himself to be ahead of schedule.
The Padres are bringing in minor-league pitchers today to face some of their hitters who haven’t gotten a lot of at-bats lately, and Bogaerts could face those pitchers depending on how he feels.
He could also head to the team’s complex in Peoria, Ariz., in the coming days to get several at-bats before joining the team on next week’s trip to New York and Chicago.
Marinaccio is cutting it
Marinaccio made his big-league debut with the Yankees in 2022 and between June and July of that did not allow a hit to 57 consecutive batters. That is tied with Dwight Gooden for the second-longest stretch in the major leagues since 1974 behind only Dennis Eckersley’s 71 straight batters.
Marinaccio posted a 2.05 ERA in 40 appearances in ’22 and a 3.95 ERA over 61 games the next two seasons.
The Yankees, rich in decent right-handed relievers, put him on waivers last September. He was claimed by the White Sox but never pitched for them before they designated him for assignment in January.
That is when the Padres sent some money to the White Sox in a trade.
And the 30-year-old Marinaccio was among the most impressive and talked-about relievers in Padres camp this spring.
He was under consideration to make the opening-day roster almost to the end. And then he essentially disappeared into the organization’s sea of relief pitchers.
He is now on his third call-up with the Padres.
“Every time he’s pitched, he’s done a nice job, really,” Shildt said.
Marinaccio has yet to allow a run in five appearances (8⅔ innings).
“All year, you want to be here,” he said. “Nobody wants to be in Triple-A. That’s all of our goals — to get here. But I just kept telling myself to throw the best baseball I can, and we’ll see what happens. That’s still the plan — to try to keep doing that.”
Last night was the first time Marinaccio pitched for the Padres in a game in which the margin was not at least six runs one way or the other.
And it was the first time he worked his way through an entire lineup. He allowed three hits while facing 12 batters. He threw just 33 pitches (27 strikes) in his first time going three innings since 2021, when he was in Double-A with the Yankees.
Of those 12 at-bats against him, 11 were by right-handed hitters.
That prompted Marinaccio to feature his new cutter, a pitch he developed in the spring and refined by necessity in the thin air and high altitude of the Pacific Coast League.
“It’s been my first trip through the PCL this year, so it’s definitely smacked me in the face a little bit,” Marinaccio said. “I took the East Coast for granted. But it’s helped me develop this cutter, because it’s a pitch that I needed there. The sweeper doesn’t quite work the same. Neither does the changeup or the fastball. But the shorter-moving pitches tend to play a little bit better, a little bit more in control out there. So it’s helped me throw that pitch a lot. I gained experience with that at a little bit of a less-stressful environment.”
He put that experience into practice last night, throwing the cutter nine times. It ended six outs, got two misses and was hit for a single.
“Tonight was the first time I’ve really had to lean on that as much as I did,” he said. “So it was nice to see that.”
Musgrove update
The time is growing close for the Padres to make a decision on whether Joe Musgrove is simply preparing for 2026 or getting himself ready to possibly work out of the bullpen at some point in the postseason.
Indications point toward his not pitching for the team in 2025, but a meeting is expected in the coming days to discuss the possibilities.
Musgrove’s fastball is regularly sitting in the mid-90s, and he is throwing all his secondary pitches as well in bullpen session. He could begin facing hitters by the end of the month.
The priority for him and the team has always been next season. But Musgrove has maintained something of a dual track.
“If there’s a chance, I’ll keep going,” he said this week.
The difference is how much he starts to ramp up and how he goes about the offseason. He could go pitch in the Arizona Fall League or winter ball if he doesn’t pitch in the postseason.
Tidbits
- You can read in Jeff Sanders’ game preview (here) about reliever David Morgan’s prognosis after being placed on the injured list yesterday.
- Check out Annie Heilbrunn’s Q&A (here) with O’Hearn, who talks about some important attitude adjustments he made along the way to becoming an All-Star.
- Tatis struck out four times, twice on three pitches. In all, he saw 16 pitches last night. It was the first time this season and just the third time in his career he has struck out four times in a game. He is 2-for-12 with eight strikeouts over the past three games.
- Laureano’s on-base streak ended after a career-high 12 games.
- Cronenworth has at least one hit, walk, sacrifice fly or hit by a pitch in 24 consecutive games. His on-base percentage is .419 in that span. His .369 OBP for the season has him on pace for a career high.
- Wandy Peralta relieved Marinaccio with one out and a runner on first base in the eighth inning and retired the next two batters. It was the 47th runner Peralta has inherited, fifth most in the major leagues. He has stranded 34 of those, a rate of 70.2% that ranks 26th among the 52 relievers who have inherited at least 29 runners.
All right, that’s it for me.
There might not be a newsletter tomorrow morning. I will still cover tonight’s game, and you can find that coverage on our Padres page.
The next newsletter will probably be in your inbox Monday morning. But I may do one for tomorrow. (It will be a surprise for all of us.)
Talk to you whenever.