Good morning from Los Angeles,

It might seem like a strange thing to say about a victory that got a team’s magic number down to one.

But last night was about more than the win. It was also about who the win was against.

“Getting a win in Dodger Stadium against the Dodgers is also a big thing too,” Padres manager Craig Stammen said. “You know, they’re a great team, and any time we can get a win against them, it’s a good deal.”

He volunteered that at the start of the postgame media gaggle in his office, right after acknowledging the spot the victory put the Padres in relative to the postseason.

For David Morgan and Bradgley Rodriguez and Dustin Harris and Manny Machado and everyone playing for and coaching and managing the Padres, last night’s 5-1 victory over the Dodgers was validation that they can beat anyone as long as they play well.

“I think we’ve just got to keep playing our game,” Machado said when asked about the significance of beating a good team. “We’ve been playing good baseball for a couple months now. So I think that’s what we’ve got to continue to do and continue to rely on those strengths that we have as a group … as best as we can.”

It is true the Padres’ 38-17  record since July 24 is best in the major leagues.

That includes them going 28-9 against teams with losing records.

This newsletter often includes what amounts to a defense of beating bad teams. There has been one MLB team to ever make the postseason without a winning record against sub.-500 teams. Piling up wins against losing teams is a hallmark of winning teams.

It’s not that the Padres’ doubted they could come out on top against the league’s best. A sweep of the Brewers, who have MLB’s best record, was among the three series victories the Padres have against teams with winning records since Aug. 24.

But their most recent victory over such a team before last night was Sept. 6 against the Yankees. The fact is the Padres won 13 of their 14 games leading up to this series by almost exclusively exploiting bad pitching and bad teams.

It might not have been a must-win for the Dodgers, but they are still trying to lock up a first-round bye and they fielded their “A” squad.

Last night was Shohei Ohtani’s first game in 2½ weeks, and Yoshinobu Yamamoto was the Dodgers’ starting pitcher.

“The guy is probably going to finish top-three in the Cy Young (voting),” Jake Cronenworth said. “It’s one of those things — quality at-bat, quality at-bat, grinding him down. He’s going to execute at a super-high level. That’s what he does. … Not everybody’s going to get a hit off that guy because of the level of execution. But can you foul some pitches off and get his pitch count, maybe tire him out for the next guy. We did what we had to do.”

You can read my game story (here) for details.

In short, the Padres played a playoff brand of baseball.

Robbie Ray was Robbie Ray. He allowed an abundance of baserunners, but he pitched into the fourth inning with the Padres holding a 2-0 lead.

“It felt like a playoff atmosphere, a playoff game,” Ray said. “That’s the purpose this time of year — to win the game.”

Five relievers made big pitch after big pitch against one of the most relentless lineups in the game.

Machado hit a two-run homer in the fourth inning. The Padres scored twice in the fifth after two infield singles, a bunt by Harris that resulted in a Yamamoto throwing the ball away and Fernando Tatis Jr. tagging up and scoring on a shallow fly ball. Samad Taylor walked, stole bases on back-to-back pitches and scored on Freddy Fermin’s single in the ninth.

Croneworth made a couple excellent plays at second base. Jackson Merrill ran down two balls that a number of center fielders probably would not have reached.

The whole thing was well played. It was hard fought. It went like not a whole lot of games have gone for the Padres against the Dodgers (and especially in Dodger Stadium) in a long time. A long, long time. Since before Dodgers manager Dave Roberts was a coach for the Padres.

“It’s always big when you’re facing the team that won our division,” Stammen said. “Somehow we’re gonna have to beat them. They’ve won the World Series the last (two) years. All 29 teams are trying to beat that team. And so when we get a chance to go up against them in their house, it’s always nice when you get a win.”

Where it stands

The biggest thing the Padres did last night was assure they can earn a playoff spot by winning one of their final four games.

They might not even have to do that.

After two days being able to clinch with a victory and a Diamondbacks loss, it is a matter of “or” today. As in, a Padres victory or a Diamondbacks loss clinches a playoff berth for the Padres.

Also, since the Cubs and Phillies lost yesterday and the Padres moved a game ahead of them, the Padres could get in without another victory as long as one of those two teams also failed to win any of their final four games.

Getting into the top wild-card spot last night means the Padres control their destiny in terms of hosting their first-round playoff series.

To do that, they just have to win at least as many games as the Phillies and Cubs do the rest of the wat. If one of those two finishes with the same record as the Padres, that team would be the No.4 seed by virtue of having won the season series against the Padres.

The Padres want to host that first series. The people who have to worry about the budget do, for sure. The difference between being the home team and the road team is the difference between making a few million dollars and losing about $1 million because of the costs associated with a large traveling party.

And certainly, being at home provides an advantage. The Padres are 49-29 at home and 39-41 on the road this season. (For the record, the visiting team is 9-7 since the playoffs were expanded and the three-game wild-card series was implemented in 2022.)

More important to the Padres is lining up their starting rotation and making sure their high-leverage relievers are rested.

That is not to say they won’t try to win enough to earn the No.4 seed. But they won’t be starting Michael King on Sunday unless they have to win that game to get in the postseason. And they do plan on getting Machado and others at least one day off after clinching.

Salas to the rescue

Ethan Salas just keeps helping the Padres win.

His single and the run he scored in last night’s fifth inning were big. But what he did in the previous half-inning was arguably the biggest moment of the game.

With Ohtani at the plate with two outs and the bases loaded, Morgan appeared to have issued a walk that would have tied the game 2-2.

But Salas challenged the call by home plate umpire Ryan Additon. And he was right. Barely.

“Really good to get that pitch,” Salas said. “… I thought it was close, maybe a little high, but in that situation I feel like it’s a time that we can use it if we get it right or wrong. Bases loaded like that, we don’t want to walk a guy in. So first instinct, we just go to tap the head. I thought it was close enough. Caught it, definitely clipped where it did. So thankfully, it did.”

Morgan did still have to retire the guy who is considered the best hitter in the major leagues.

He did so after two foul balls, getting Ohtani to swing over a sinker on the outer third.

“Just go right at him,” Morgan said. “There’s no backing off it right there.”

He would not have gotten the chance without a 20-year-old catcher who played just 17 games with the ABS system in Triple-A before being called up on Sept. 1 having the wherewithal to make the kind of challenge Padres catchers have not been all that good at making.

“Ethan having the nuts right there to go after that challenge was big — keeping us in that at-bat and ultimately getting the punchout,” Morgan said.

That was Salas’ fourth time getting a ball-four call reversed, tying him with Luis Campusano for most among Padres catchers. After going 3-for-3 last night, Salas is 12-for-17 on challenges.

“He’s a confident kid,” Stammen said. “And he’s using it behind the plate.”

Another 2 for B-Rod

The Padres got Jason Adam, one of the most dependable high-leverage relievers in the major leagues over the past five seasons, back in their bullpen yesterday.

But they did not want to have his first big-league appearance after three months on the injured list to come with a slim lead at Dodger Stadium.

So the plan after Yuki Matsui worked the fifth inning was to have Rodriguez and Adrian Morejón get through the sixth, seventh and eighth in some manner.

Rodriguez, the rookie who a week ago got a four-day rest because his velocity was waning under his heavy workload, took down the first two innings.

“The way Bradgley threw the first inning, he was just pretty dominant,” Stammen said. “So I felt really good about bringing him out there for the second one.”

Rodriguez surrendered a leadoff double to Andy Pages in the sixth before striking out the next two batters and getting Mookie Betts on an inning-ending grounder. In the seventh, Ohtani flied out to center before Rodriguez walked Will Smith and then retired Freddie Freeman on a fly ball to left field and struck out Teoscar Hernández.

The 99.1 mph fastball Hernández swung through was Rodriguez’s fourth pitch at least 99 mph in the seventh inning. That was after he hit 100 mph seven times in the sixth inning. That was four more 100 mph pitches than he had thrown in any game this season and one more than his career high set last season.

Last night was the seventh time in his career that Rodriguez has gone two innings. He has not allowed a run in those seven appearances.

Jeff Sanders’ pregame story (here) had the news about Adam being activated along with the corresponding moves.

“We’ll figure out a time to use him in the right way,” Stammen said after the game. “I think we’d rather not bring him in in crazy high-leverage situations at the beginning. But eventually, you know, he’s the guy that has been in a lot of those situations at times. Try to ease him back in as best we can.”

Familiar

If the Padres end up facing the Dodgers in the postseason, they will see Yamamoto for at least a fifth time in 2026.

Last night was his fourth quality start against the Padres this season, as two of the four runs he allowed in his six innings were unearned.

But the Padres scored more runs against him than they had in any of his past six starts against

Last night was just the fifth time in Yamamoto’s 28 starts this season that he allowed more than two runs. It was the first time this season he did so against the Padres, who he had allowed a total of three runs in 20 innings before last night.

Tidbits

Tatis went 3-for-5 and extended his on-base streak to 17 games. Last night was his 17th game with at least three hits this season, most in the major leagues. Tatis is batting .333 with a .418 on-base percentage during his streak, which is third-longest on the team this season behind his 23-game streak in June and Machado’s 19-game streak in July.
Tatis’ .995 OPS since the All-Star break is best in the major leagues among those with more than 105 plate appearances. The Cubs’ Pete Crow-Armstrong, the presumptive National League MVP, has a .994 OPS since the break.
Morejón got three one-pitch outs and threw a total of six pitches in the eighth inning. It was his 12th time getting three outs in nine pitches or less this season. He is averaging 15.4 pitches per inning, almost 1½ fewer pitches per inning than the average MLB reliever this season. That efficiency is a big part of why he has been able to throw a career-high 83⅔  innings in 74 appearances this season.
Rodriguez has a 2.25 ERA and 2.78 FIP in 72 innings. He is just the third rookie reliever in the past 10 seasons to have an ERA and FIP that low while throwing at least 70 innings. One of the others is current Braves rookie Didier Fuentes (2.40 ERA, 2.24 FIP).
Salas was 1-for-2 last night and is 6-for-17 since beginning his career 0-for-15.
Austin Hays had a pinch-hit single off left-hander Kris Bubic last night, his eighth hit in his past 13 at-bats against lefties. Hays is batting (.367) 18-for-49  against lefties since joining the Padres last month. The way Hays is hitting lefties, in addition to Taylor’s play, is why the Padres are in no hurry to activate Migue Andujar off the injured list.
Machado’s home run was the 398th of his career, moving him into a tie with Dale Murphy for 62nd all-time.
It was also Machado’s 29th home run of the season, the ninth time he has reached that mark. He is one of 34 players to ever have that many seasons with at least that many homers.
And, finally, it was Machado’s 32nd career home run against the Dodgers, most against any team in his career, and his 16th as a visitor at Dodger Stadium, his most at any ballpark as a visitor.
Should the Padres secure a playoff spot by Saturday, there is a good chance they will have clarity by then on where their first-round series will be. That is because the storm expected to pound the Northeast this weekend prompted MLB to move Sunday’s season finale between the Cubs and Red Sox to be part of a doubleheader on Friday with the teams scheduled to play their final game Saturday.

All right, that’s it for me.

Talk to you tomorrow.