The Padres kept rolling Saturday night, beating the Miami Marlins in walk-off fashion for their fourth straight win and nudging themselves past the Philadelphia Phillies in the National League playoff race.
The finish belonged to Ethan Salas. The rookie catcher, called up on Sept. 1, came off the bench in the bottom of the 10th inning and delivered his first career walk-off in a scene that sent San Diego home with a huge result. He did it as a pinch hitter, capping an extra-inning game that kept swinging back and forth.
San Diego is now 86-69 and holds the No. 5 seed in the NL. The Padres are tied with the Chicago Cubs and one game ahead of the Phillies, who are 85-60 and now sit in the No. 6 spot. With only seven games left in the regular season, the Padres’ magic number to clinch a postseason berth is down to three.
This one had far more chaos than Friday’s pitchers’ duel. Both teams left runners stranded in the first inning, but the Marlins broke through against Casey Mize in the second. A pair of singles, a fielder’s choice and a two-run homer from Otto Lopez put Miami in front.
San Diego answered right away. Samad Taylor homered in the bottom of the second, though the Marlins kept the pressure on by adding two more runs in the third as Mize continued to struggle in a Padres uniform.
The Padres’ offense, though, stayed hot and kept finding ways to chip back. In the bottom of the third, they used small ball to score three times, getting runs on a bases-loaded walk, a bases-loaded balk and a sacrifice fly.
Fernando Tatis Jr. then erased the deficit the loud way, leading off the bottom of the fourth with a home run that tied the game at five.
San Diego finally moved in front in the sixth, when Ty France doubled home a run to give the Padres their first lead of the night.
The late innings turned tense. Mason Miller entered in the eighth and escaped a serious jam by stranding runners on the corners with one out, but Griffin Conine tied it again with a home run in the top of the ninth.
David Morgan kept the Marlins off the board in the 10th, setting the stage for Salas’ winning moment in the bottom half. With one swing, the 20-year-old pushed the Padres into the No. 5 seed and finished off a wild night in San Diego.
In Other News...
Padres Suddenly Have A Catching Dilemma They Cant Ignore
Luis Campusano has made this a real conversation for the Padres as September winds down. His bat has been the biggest reason, with a .267/.362/.446 line and eight home runs through 232 plate appearances, production that has helped him stay in the mix even as San Diego continues to evaluate how the catching job should look headed into October. Freddy Fermin remains part of the equation, and the Padres are now weighing how to keep both players involved while getting the most from the position.
Ethan Salas recent call-up has only added another layer to the decision. The organization now has three catchers in the picture, each bringing a different kind of value as the playoff push tightens, and the challenge is finding a postseason arrangement that makes sense without leaving too much offense or defense on the bench. For a team with serious ambitions, it is the sort of roster question that can shape how the final month feels long before the first playoff game arrives. [Read more 🡒]
Fernando Tatis Jr. Finally Solved The Padres Biggest Stretch Run Need
Fernando Tatis Jr. spent the first part of the season looking a little off at the plate, but a mechanical tweak to his batting stance in late May changed the shape of his year. Since then, the Padres star has looked much more like himself, with the power returning in a big way and his slugging percentage climbing well above where it had been during those early weeks. Even before the bat fully caught up, he was still finding ways to help by getting on base and using his legs, which kept him relevant while the offense searched for a steadier gear.
For a Padres team trying to stay afloat in the NL Wild Card race, that turnaround matters as much as any deadline addition. The biggest stretch-run question around this club was whether Tatis could become the middle-of-the-order force San Diego needed, and his recent surge has gone a long way toward answering it. The lingering question now is whether he can keep that version of himself in place when the pressure rises even more. [Read more 🡒]
Ethan Salas Is Giving Padres Fans Even More To Believe In
Ethan Salas arrived in San Diego with the kind of buzz that usually takes a prospect years to build, and he wasted little time giving Padres fans a reason to lean in. After earning the call from the minors on the strength of his play there, the teenage catcher jumped straight into the big-league spotlight and flashed the sort of upside that has made him one of the organizations most closely watched young players.
Salas has already shown he can make an impact at the plate, including a triple and two home runs in his first MLB games, and in the process he became the youngest catcher in major league history to turn in a multi-homer game. Even with the early offensive noise, he has kept pointing back to a team-first approach and steady work behind the plate, a combination that only adds to the intrigue around how quickly he can settle in. [Read more 🡒]