The sudden pop of back-to-back home runs by Seiya Suzuki and Carson Kelly lifted the Chicago Cubs to a 3-1 victory on Tuesday afternoon at Wrigley Field, pushing the San Diego Padres to the brink of playoff elimination.
The crowd of 39,114 remained relatively subdued through four innings as Chicago’s offense stayed quiet against Padres starter Nick Pivetta. And then Suzuki and Kelly flipped Game 1 of this National League Wild Card Series with two huge swings.
The last time the Cubs hit back-to-back homers in the playoffs was during their 2016 dream season, when Miguel Montero and Dexter Fowler did it against the Los Angeles Dodgers in Game 1 of the NL Championship Series.
Now that the 162-game marathon has turned into a sprint, the Padres must quickly regroup or else their season could end on the first day of October.