Good morning,
The Padres got back home and got back to playing dominant baseball.
Last night’s 8-0 victory over the Rockies was the their eighth victory in eight home games.
It’s way too early to be talking about home and road trends. But let’s take a quick look anyway:
You can read in my game story (here) about how last night’s game turned on the Padres’ six-run fifth inning, which imploded what to that point had been pitchers’ duel between Nick Pivetta and Germán Márquez.
Márquez was gone before the fifth inning was over. Pivetta kept going. How he got to his seven scoreless innings is also detailed in the game story, and we will dive a little deeper into his night later in the newsletter.
Right now, let’s continue to marvel at all the ways the Padres continue to force the action and find ways to score.
Their biggest inning of the year sort of encapsulated it.
The fifth began with Xander Bogaerts grounding a single through the left side. He then stole second base. Thing was, the steal came on a hit-and-run on which Jose Iglesias turned away from a fastball extremely inside. Bogaerts got a good jump, but he was convinced he would have been out had the throw to second not been wide.
Iglesias then grounded a single into right field to score Bogaerts before Jason Heyward reached on catcher interference when his swing hit catcher Hunter Goodman’s glove.
Both runners moved up 90 feet on Brandon Lockridge’s sacrifice bunt, and Elias Díaz drove in both with a single.
Fernando Tatis Jr. followed with a single that moved Díaz to third base. And on Tatis’ steal of second, Goodman’s throw sailed into center field, allowing Díaz to run home.
A two-out double by Manny Machado brought in Tatis.
Two walks followed to load the bases, and Iglesias’ slow roller to third base went for an RBI single.
You can call some of that good fortune. And that would not be inaccurate.
But when it happens as much as it has for the Padres this season, it is also a brand of baseball that cannot be denied.
The Padres strike out less frequently (every 5.67 plate appearances) than any team except the Diamondbacks (5.83) and have put more balls in play (27.4 per game) than any team.
That is one way for a team to enhance its “luck.”
The Padres have scored at least one run in eight games — including two one-run victories and six victories overall — with help from an out and/or an error. That includes sacrifice flies and fielder’s choices.
“We’re just taking advantage of everything right now,” Tatis said. “We’re going to put the ball in play. We’re going to move the runner. We’re just going to play really good baseball. And when we don’t, it’s disappointing. I see we can do it, and I believe we can do it in the long run.”
Pivetta pounds
Pivetta last night looked very much like the pitcher who was so dominant in his Padres debut on March 30 and nothing like the pitcher who lasted just three innings while allowing three runs, yielding six hits and walking three last Saturday in Chicago.
“Just pounded the strike zone,” he said. “… Just executed in the counts I needed to and just tried to get in the dugout as quick as I could.”
Pivetta’s fastball is a marvel when he is doing what he did last night, which was throwing strikes.
He topped out at 96 mph with his four-seam fastball last night. But since he gets elite extension, meaning because of his long arms and delivery he lets go of the ball closer to the plate than the average pitcher, and his four-seamer appears to defy gravity, his 94 mph fastball looks more like 97 or 98 mph to the guy trying to hit it.
The pitch has an average induced vertical break of 21 inches. Induced vertical break is, essentially, a measurement of how much a ball does not drop, so it appears to batters to rise. What you need to know about IVB is that anything above 18 inches is really good. And 21 is excellent.
What you need to know about Pivetta last night is that he was getting ahead and then blowing that fastball past batters at the top or above the strike zone.
Last week, when he was rarely ahead of batters, the Cubs could lay off that pitch above the zone.
Last night, Pivetta threw a first-pitch strike to 20 of the 25 batters he faced and had 14 two-strike counts to the 23 batters who faced more than one pitch.
That ran counter to 12 first-pitch strikes to 19 batters and five two-strike counts to the 14 Cubs batters who saw more than one pitch. And it looked like his first start, also seven scoreless innings, in which he threw a first-pitch strike to 14 of the 21 Braves batters he faced and got two strikes against 12 of the 18 batters who faced more than one pitch.
“Very similar,” Padres manager Mike Shildt said. “Nick was exceptional. Controlled counts, dominated the 0-0, the 1-1. Set himself up some great counts. Fastball had a ton of life to it. It was really jumping and riding. Top of the zone. Had some Giddy up, regardless of really where it was in the zone.”
Looks fine
We can’t exactly assess the health of Tatis’ left shoulder based on results. The guy led the National League with 42 home runs in 2021 with a shoulder that popped out of its socket no less than five times from spring training to the end of the season. (He ended up having surgery to repair a torn labrum in 2022.)
But he did hit a ball really hard (112.8 mph, his highest exit velocity of the season) and a long way (391 feet) last night for his third home run of 2025. And he again maintained afterward that the irritation in his shoulder, which caused him to leave Tuesday’s game and sit out Wednesday’s game, is not a long-term issue.
“No, no,” he said. “Just for now. Stay on top of it and take care of business when it’s needed. … Just working on it. Put in some good work. The training staff has been unbelievable. They are staying on top of it.”
Staying power
The difference between players who come and go and those that stick in the big leagues is consistency.
“The game can be a challenge, man,” Shildt said. “It’s not an easy game. … Your ability is your ability at this level, but the separator is the ability to, when you struggle with this game, be able to make a mental adjustment, to allow your physical adjustment to take place and to go to a good place to know that you can do it.”
Therein lies the difference between Gavin Sheets so far in ‘25 and the guy who struggled the past two seasons to the point that the horrible White Sox declined to tender him a contract this winter.
For the second time in the past five games, Sheets found his stroke after a bad start.
It happened Sunday in Chicago against the Cubs when he struck out three times before hitting two singles, the second of which drove in the game-tying run. Last night, he struck out on three pitches in his first at-bat, chasing two curveballs well below the zone at the end.
It was his third strikeout in six plate appearances and it came on the heels of a seven-game stretch in which he was 3-for-19 with seven strikeouts.
Sheets went on to finish his night with a single in the fourth inning, a walk in the fifth and a home run in the seventh.
“It’s having confidence,” said Sheets, who spent the offseason getting back to the swing and approach that got him to the major leagues and made him successful in 2021 and ‘22. “It’s not having to tinker. It’s not making things longer than it needs to be. It’s, ‘Hey, we’ve got a swing that works. Keep trusting it.’ Make minor adjustments, whether it’s effort level or whatever it might be. But we’ve got a swing that works. There’s nothing to change.
“It feels incredible. I’m not throwing stuff at the wall hoping it sticks. I’m not trying to make big changes, swing changes while trying to compete at the big-league level. It’s minor adjustments to succeed tonight and then on to the next one.”
Win, win
Pivetta works quickly. He takes little time between pitches. And when he is on, he doesn’t throw a lot of pitches.
Thus, he has worked two of the Padres’ three quickest games this season.
Last night’s game lasted two hours, seven minutes. His first start was 2:21. The only quicker game was the 2:19 for Monday’s 5-4 victory in Sacramento that was started by Michael King.
“I just try to keep the pace good so that my infielders are ready and on their feet,” Pivetta said. “And the game just goes in the way that we want it to go. It’s nine o’clock and we’re all hanging out here, and it’s just a good win.”
And the sportswriter who has a 9 p.m. deadline for the print edition says, “Amen.”
Wade’s message
Tyler Wade is back with the Padres, called up yesterday to replace Jake Cronenworth, who went on the 10-day injured list with a fractured rib.
But Wade was already contributing in San Diego.
Wade committed this spring to donating some of the proceeds from his recently released “Give Yourself Flowers” clothing collection to San Diego Youth Services, a nonprofit that strives to help all children reach their goals.
Wade inspired a line of clothing from Pirate Worldwide, an apparel company that has a purposeful story behind all its products.
Good mental health is the impetus behind Wade’s line.
“Mental health has affected my family,” Wade said this spring. “And I think as athletes, we all go through it. Not even athletes. I think any human, right? Whether it’s your profession, you work at T-Mobile, whatever it may be, I think we all go through it. And so meeting them, that kind of sparked the idea of, with my platform, I feel like I can spread awareness for mental health and also have a cool clothing line behind it.”
Wade said he hopes the clothing line (which you can find here) can spark conversations.
“I feel like as men, you kind of suppress those feelings,” he said. “Like, I’m embarrassed to talk about it. Whether it’s like, ‘Oh, I just got released.’ It’s like, now I’m afraid to tell somebody that, because, usually people identify themselves, like, ‘Oh, I’m Tyler Wade the baseball player,’ not Tyler Wade the human. So just kind of normalizing that and making sure people aren’t alone and making sure, like, there’s always a voice.”
Darvish update
Yu Darvish could throw off a mound as soon as today.
He has been playing long toss out to 180 feet and said he could do a light bullpen today “if I feel good.”
His last time throwing off a mound was in a spring training game on March 13. He played catch the next day but was shut down after that with elbow discomfort.
It is likely he would need multiple bullpen sessions and at least two minor-league games before returning, which probably means he is at least three weeks from pitching for the Padres.
Tidbits
- Jeff Sanders’ notebook (here) explains how Cronenworth will likely be out longer (perhaps much longer) than the 10 days he is required to be by being placed on the IL. The designation of his fracture being nondisplaced is a positive, in that it means the break was not complete and the bone remains in alignment. But Cronenworth still could be looking at a late May or June return.
- Machado has hit safely in six consecutive games. He is 8-for-25 (.320) with a home run, three doubles and three walks during the streak.
- Diaz batted .265 last season, including .190 (4-for-21) after ing the Padres on Sept. 1. But he led the Padres with a 25% line drive rate in the season’s final month and had a horribly unfavorable .200 batting average on balls in play. So maybe it shouldn’t be entirely surprising that last night was his third multi-hit game in eight starts this season. Diaz is batting .250 (7-for-28).
- Bogaerts extended his hitting streak to six games. He is batting .417 (10-for-24) with two doubles and two walks in that stretch.
- Last night was Tatis’ 14th career game with at least one home run and one stolen base. That moved him into a tie with Wil Myers for second most in Padres history, five behind Dave Winfield.
- Tatis’ home run was his 64th at Petco Park, which also moved him into a tie with Myers for third in franchise history behind Adrián González (65) and Machado (91).
- This year’s Padres have matched the 1998 squad for the best 14-game start in franchise history (11-3). The ‘98 team got to 14-3 before taking its fourth loss.
- If the Padres win today, they will improve to 33-33 against the Rockies since the start of the 2021 season. The remarkable thing about the Padres’ struggles against Colorado is that the Padres’ .535 winning percentage since ‘21 is tied for 10th best in MLB while the Rockies’ .402 winning percentage ranks last among the 30 teams.
All right, that’s it for me.
Talk to you tomorrow
