Good morning from my layover,
The Padres, for just the second time this season, had a chance yesterday to move to three games above .500.
They did not.
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Not even close.
Instead, they played one of their worst games of the season, lost 9-1 to the Marlins and perhaps lost one of their top starting pitchers for a time.
You can read in my game story (here) about how poorly the Padres performed as they missed an opportunity to earn their first series sweep of 2024.
“The game was not clean,” manager Mike Shildt said. “Wasn’t our best effort. No question about it.”
Yeah, it was ugly. It stood out because games like that haven’t happened often for the Padres this season. Yesterday’s game was the final one in a stretch of 11 games in 10 days. That doesn’t mean they needed to be dropping balls all over Petco Park. But it happens.
Yu Darvish was getting tests on his left hamstring late yesterday afternoon following his early departure from the game. That is a concern. The ongoing wellness and readiness of his 37-year-old body will cause a measure of worry every time he isn’t quite right.
What the Padres unequivocally say is not a concern is that they have yet to take off on a winning streak of any great length and establish themselves as a certain playoff contender.
“We’re playing really good baseball right now,” Manny Machado said. “And it’s not our best. So, eventually we’re gonna get into it. … We’re playing really good baseball. It’s gonna come.”
This is where alarm bells go off in the minds of those who followed along last year as the Padres laissez faired their way to an 82-80 record and early offseason. Machado’s words sound an awful lot like last year’s professions of faith that were never realized — at least not until it was too late.
But at the risk of being repetitive — though that is in many ways exactly what an MLB season is about — it must be pointed out that the Padres are in many ways performing like a really good team.
Like, actually a good team. Not last year’s run differential darlings — a team that was 27-32 at this point but had outscored its opponents by seven runs (and by the end of the season would have a plus-104 run differential, highest ever for a team with fewer than 84 wins).
That team was, through 59 games, 3-11 in one-run games and 0-5 in extra-inning games and was batting .196 with runners in scoring position and .221 overall. That team won when its Big Four produced.
This team is 6-6 in one-run games, 2-0 in extra innings and is batting .254 with runners in scoring position and .255 overall. This team is winning despite its Big Three not producing.
The Padres were 14-18 on April 29.
They are 16-11 since. That is a pace that will get them to 90 wins, which will almost certainly get them in the postseason.
It was with the past month’s results in mind that Shildt pushed back yesterday on a question that included a reference to the Padres being on something of a rollercoaster.
“I want to ride every rollercoaster I can ever get on winning seven out of nine series,” Shildt said. “You sign me up for that ride, I’m all on board. Because, you know, if you go 6-4 the whole season, you win 96 games. So I mean, I do understand the question (when) you talk about ‘taking off.’ But gosh, man, I don’t have a great answer for winning seven out of nine series not being good enough.”
Truth is, taken as a whole, if the 2024 season is a rollercoaster, it has lacked any big dips or steep climbs. The Padres lost five in a row in late April and immediately followed that by winning four straight.
Here is how their first 59 games have broken down so far:
- By 15-game stretches: 7-8, 7-8, 8-7, 8-6
- By 10-game stretches: 4-6, 7-3, 3-7, 6-4, 5-5, 5-4
- By six-game stretches: 3-3, 2-4, 4-2, 3-3, 2-4, 4-2, 3-3, 3-3, 3-3, 3-2
“I think every year in baseball, it’s a roller coaster,” Machado said. “It’s ups and downs. There’s good, there’s bad, there’s a lot in between. … It’s a ride, and you’ve just got to enjoy it every single moment. You ride the highs, and you ride the lows just as much as you ride the highs. But the roller coaster hasn’t been so bumpy. It’s been riding pretty pretty smoothly so far. There’s been a little bit of up, a little bit of down. But it’s been riding pretty consistent.”
So far, 2024 has seemed more like watching a dog chase its tail than a thrill ride.
Shildt taking what he termed “exception” to a couple questions after the game should not be construed as his being OK with what happened yesterday or unaware that his team would do well to reel off some wins.
All around the Padres clubhouse yesterday, there were both assertions they are good and an acknowledgement they have not been good enough.
“We’ve bounced back well after some tough losses, we’ve shown that we can come back to win a series even after we lose the first game,” Jake Cronenworth said. “I think there’s definitely a next gear. We just need to find it and get there.”
There may come a time where it no longer flies to simply talk about the process. The win-loss record matters. Generally, winning teams build their records with good spurts.
When it was proffered to Machado that at some point a championship contender has to go on a lengthy run, he said, “That’s fair.”
(Machado saying “That’s fair” to one of my points is essentially a full-throated “Amen!”)
Of the 24 playoff teams over the past two seasons, 19 had at least one winning streak of at least seven games en route to the postseason. Three others had multiple six-game winning streaks. All had at least one five-game winning streak.
All had at least three winning streaks of at least four games. The Padres have one such streak so far.
“We’re doing a lot of good things … that over a long period of a year — if we’re doing this, if we’re playing baseball like how we’re playing now, consistently — good things will come from that,” Machado said. “There’s a lot of good things. Obviously, we haven’t really gotten on a nice little hot streak to get us going and get ourselves over .500 and a good lead.”
Tidbits
- Xander Bogaerts received good news this week when specialist Dr. Neal ElAttrache examined images of his fractured left shoulder and confirmed Bogaerts does not need surgery. The timeline for his return (two to three months) remains the same.
- The bullpen not only allowed one more run (six) in six innings yesterday than it had in its previous 40 innings, it had its streak of 11 consecutive inherited runners stranded stopped when Enyel De Los Santos allowed his two inherited runners to score in the fifth inning.
- De Los Santos has surrendered at least one home run in six of his past 12 games. He did not allow a homer in his first 13 appearances this season.
- Donovan Solano was 2-for-4 yesterday and went 6-for-10 in the series against the team for which he made his MLB debut in 2012. Solano is batting .389 (14-for-36) since joining the Padres on May 5.
- Machado extended his hitting streak to eight games, during which he is batting .310 (9-for-29).
- Catcher Luis Campusano was 0-for-4 yesterday and is batting .086 (3-for-35) in 11 games since May 15. Backup catcher Kyle Higashioka is 0-for-14 in that span.
- Marlins first baseman Josh Bell was 7-for-13 in the series. Bell had 21 hits in 88 at-bats (.239) at Petco Park after being acquired from the Nationals along with Juan Soto in 2022.
- Please check out Jeff Sanders’ story (here) on Jeremiah Estrada’s joy about a development with the MLB The Show video game in the wake of his record strikeout streak. Estrada is a lot of fun.
- Bryce Miller wrote (here) about Jurickson Profar’s season, which could result in his making his first All-Star game — in the place where his career began a dozen years ago.
- I was remiss in not noting that Tuesday’s game was the shortest of the season at two hours, one minute.
All right, that’s it for me.
No game today, so no newsletter tomorrow.
Sanders will have a story on our Padres page later today about the bullpen and how the roles have evolved and settled.
The next Padres Daily will be in your inbox Saturday morning after the Padres face Michael Wacha and the Royals tomorrow night.
