Good morning,
A closer has to be ready.
If he is available to pitch in a game, it doesn’t matter the score. He can never check out. His team could come back. He might be needed
Mason Miller knows this.
He earned his 30th save last night. It was the 11th one in which he was closing out a victory in which the Padres scored the go-ahead run in the seventh inning or later.
“Done being surprised, that’s for sure,” Miller said. “We’ve done it a lot this year.”
Last night’s 3-2 victory over the Brewers was the Padres’ 25th this season decided in the seventh inning or later. It was their 18th victory in a game they trailed by two or more runs and their 33rd comeback overall.
You can read in my game story (here) about Casey Mize’s resilient rebound and Jackson Merrill’s two-run homer in the seventh inning that brought the Padres back.
It seems the Padres might need every one of these harrowing victories to make the playoffs.
It also may end up that they were too hurt and got going too late to make the playoffs.
We have to wait and see how their chase of the Diamondbacks and Phillies goes.
But last night’s victory was their 13th in 17 games.
They are playing better more consistently than they have all season, and that makes the great escapes like last night seem more substantial.
This was the fourth time in 17 games the Padres decided a victory in the seventh inning or later. It was their sixth comeback victory in that span.
This is reminiscent of the beginning of the season when they practically seemed incapable of taking an early lead.
In fact, the last time they played the Brewers, in mid-May, Miller was called on to save the only game the Padres won in that series after Gavin Sheets’ three-run homer gave the Padres a 3-1 lead in the ninth.
That victory was the Padres’ 25th of the season and their 13th decided in the seventh or later.
But you will recall the Padres felt like a mirage back then. Their starting pitching was already showing cracks. Their best players were not hitting. They were frequently helped by their opponents’ miscues.
“It was like we’d be losing 5-0 in the seventh inning,” Jake Cronenworth said, “and somehow we’d come back and win those games, and nobody was playing well.”
We talked a lot in the newsletter back then about how what the Padres were doing as they built what would eventually become a 29-18 record could not last. And it didn’t.
But what is happening the past few weeks is different.
“Right now,” Cronenworth said, “it just feels like a complete game, start to finish.”
This is sustainable
Complete game, start to finish does not mean perfect. Sometimes it simply means the Padres did enough.
Brewers rookie Logan Henderson has been dealing almost all season, when healthy, and he did so last night. He played darts with his fastball and had batters chasing his changeup, mostly missing and fouling off even the ones that were well-placed in the zone.
Yet, it was a changeup Henderson left almost belt high that Ty France hit over the wall in the bottom of the second inning to immediately cut the Brewers’ lead in half after they had scored twice in the top of the inning.
It was a changeup slightly lower but about thigh high that Merrill launched 431 feet to center field.
That was the Padres punishing mistakes. The lack of them doing so was a chief characteristic of an offense that ranked last in the major leagues in virtually every significant category for much of the season but is a top-5 unit in most categories over the past six weeks.
It is no coincidence that the offensive renaissance has come at the same time Merrill, Manny Machado and Fernando Tatis Jr. — the three players the Padres have built their lineup around — have turned rotten seasons around.
And then there is the difference in the starting pitching.
While getting to those 29 victories through May 18, the Padres had just 11 quality starts. Five of them were by Michael King, and the Padres lost two of those.
Last night, Mize allowed just a two-run homer by Christian Yelich in his six innings. It was just the 19th game in which a Padres starter has gone at least six innings while allowing no more than two runs, second fewest in the major leagues.
But it is something they have now done three times in the past seven games. This is just the second time all season that has happened and the first since mid-April. It is the first time three different pitchers have done it in a seven-game span.
A defensive play early in the game and one that ended the game, both of which we will talk about in-depth later, also must be acknowledged.
“We’re playing good baseball,” France said. “It was awesome to see Casey come out and do what he did tonight, and then Jackson has been unbelievable lately. But I just feel like all-around we’re playing good team baseball.”
Firing Fermin
Before Yelich came to bat with pinch-runner Brandon Lockridge on first base with two down in the ninth inning, catcher Freddy Fermin went to the mound to talk with Miller.
“Walked a guy, threw a ball to the screen, probably a good time to take a breather and reset,” Miller said with a smile.
It was also a good time for a reminder.
“I say, ‘I’m ready to throw,’” Fermin recalled. “I say, ‘He’s fast. He’s going to try to run.’”
After watching a slider and a 99 mph fastball to Yelich, Lockridge took off on the third pitch, a 102 mph fastball. Fermin got up out of his crouch as soon as Lockridge made his move. Fermin received the ball and threw a strike to the front of the base, where Sung-Mun Song applied a tag to Lockridge’s forearm as he slid by.
Game over.
FINAL: Milwaukee Brewers 2, San Diego Padres 3.
▪️Freddy Fermin nabs Brandon Lockridge, Mason Miller seals win!#MLB #ForTheFaithful pic.twitter.com/3pE8sac7AK
— San Diego Strong (@PadresStrong) August 11, 2026
“That’s the second time in my career that has happened, and I still think those are my favorite,” Miller said of finishing out a save when his catcher throws out a runner. “I get to root for my guy back there. They work really hard behind the plate always. … Moments like that, it’s kind of like their moment when you celebrate them. Everybody in the building knows that. So I think that’s really awesome.”
MASON AND FERMIN SO HYPED ABOUT THE W!!!!! pic.twitter.com/uVAUSKkK79
— Dee ★ (@scuderiaonce) August 11, 2026
Song’s stretch
Last night also featured the kind of defensive play that is often reduced to less than a footnote but in a one-run victory should be recalled as possibly helping to save the game.
After allowing the home run to Yelich, Mize surrendered a single to Luis Lara and then got David Hamilton to hit a grounder to Cronenworth.
Cronenworth’s backhand flip to Song covering the bag was high and wide, and second base umpire Alfonso Marquez ruled Song came off the bag as he caught the ball in the tip-top portion of his glove.
A call to the video room got a go-ahead by coordinator of baseball operations and advance scouting Jim McKew to challenge, which resulted in the call being overturned.
“It did not look like he kept his foot on the bag in real time, but that’s why we have the video replay guys,” Padres manager Craig Stammen said. “Jimmy McKew (was) able to dial that one in and give us a good read on if he did or not, and he barely did by a toenail, it looked like. But a great catch, a little snowcone. Should have licked it afterwards. But a great play by Song, just great defense.”
Here is a photo from Padres.TV that shows the end of the play:
“I didn’t know,” Song said through interpreter Jun Yi. “I tried to stretch it out as long as I can. I was kind of like 50-50 on it. … I didn’t know I caught it like a snow cone, because I was so focused on the foot on the base.”
His being able to make the play gave Mize two outs with a runner on first instead of one out and two on. Mize finished off the inning by getting a lineout to right field.
“It was an important out, for sure,” Mize said.
“It’s a part of the game, and I like it,” Song said. “Like always, hitting and pitching are big, but those small little details make a good game.”
Merrill’s heater
We’ve been talking about Merrill a lot lately.
Yesterday’s newsletter led with 900 words on the importance of Merrill and Tatis. A newsletter after last month’s series in Miami talked about his mechanical adjustments.
What he is doing now is reminiscent of what he did after the All-Star break in 2024.
He was 0-for-4 in the first game coming out of the break that year and then hit .320 with a .962 OPS over his final 60 games. That was the sixth-highest batting average and seventh-highest OPS in the major leagues in that span. Of his 12 home runs in that stretch, four tied eventual victories in the eighth or ninth inning, and one was a walk-off.
He was 0-for-9 through the first two games of the second half this season and is hitting .376 with a 1.146 OPS in 22 games since. Since this run began on July 19, his average ranks fourth in MLB while no one has a higher OPS. Of his MLB-leading nine homers in that stretch, two have given his team the lead for good and two have tied games.
Merrill has homered in three straight games, something he did once in 2025 and once in ‘24.
Jeff Sanders explained in his game preview (here) why Merrill is batting fifth and how he feels about it.
The reality is, Merrill has hit far better down in the lineup throughout his career. He hit fifth and sixth for all but one game after the All-Star break in 2024.
Step one
If this series is a test, coming as it does against the team with the best record in the major leagues, the Padres passed the first portion.
“I think it’s three more games in the season against a really good opponent,” Stammen said yesterday afternoon. “It’s big-league baseball. We’ve got to play our best. They’ve been playing their best for a big part of this season, and we’ll see where we’re at after three games.”
Afterward, he assessed:
“These games are all going to be close. Tonight, we got the big home run at the end to take the one-run lead, and we’re able to get to our bullpen, which is the strength of our team. But it’s going to be a tightly contested series. I expect two more games just like tonight.”
Of the 31 games the Padres and Brewers have played since the start of the 2022 season, last night was the 12th decided by one run.
“I feel like when we play these teams, the room for error is almost none,” Cronenworth said. “And I feel like we know that going into the series, and I think it brings the best out of this group when we play teams like that, especially how well they run the bases, play defense and pitch.”
At least that can be true when the Padres are playing at their best.
Here is how the Padres have done against the teams with the five best records in MLB since 2022:
Tidbits
Sanders’ pregame story (here) also had an update on Joe Musgrove the day after he threw 53 pitches in 3⅓ innings in a Triple-A game.
I wrote before last night’s game (here) about Nick Pivetta, who has run out of time to make it back by the Aug. 22 deadline to not lose his option for the 2027 season.
Fermin actually caught two runners stealing last night, though the first came when Jackson Chourio slid past second base. Nonetheless, Fermin has thrown out a major league-best 17 runners trying to steal.
Fermin has hit in seven consecutive games and in 14 consecutive starts. He is batting .362 (17-for-47) with a .907 OPS during the latter streak, which dates to June 29.
Shortstop Xander Bogaerts did not play yesterday. He has been nursing a bruised left foot since fouling a ball off it last Tuesday.
There are just eight players who primarily play first base and have an OPS of .850 or higher in 300 or more plate appearances. Ty France ranks seventh on that list. France (.291 and .872 in 329 plate appearances) and the Dodgers’ Freddie Freeman (.308 and .856 in 497 plate appearances) are the only two first basemen with at least 300 plate appearances to have an OPS of .850 or higher and a batting average of .290 or higher.
France’s home run was tied with on Tatis hit in June for the lowest by a Padres player this season. Here is what a home run that does not get more than 45 feet off the ground looks like.
SDP – Ty France Solo HR (17)
📏 369 ft | 💨 106.5 mph | 📐 18°
⚾️ 82.9 mph changeup (MIL – RHP Logan Henderson)
🏟️ Out in 7/30 parks
MIL (2) @ SDP (1)
🔻 2nd#ForTheFaithful pic.twitter.com/JuwlVJQyG0
— MLB Home Runs (@MLBHRs_) August 11, 2026
All right, that’s it for me.
Talk to you tomorrow.