SAN DIEGO — With a week remaining before their first playoff series in 14 years, the San Diego Padres’ main aim is to be rested and ready.
That, though, supposedly comes after the priority of securing the No. 4 seed and a home series to start the postseason.
“We control our destiny with being able to lock down the fourth spot,” manager Jayce Tingler said Tuesday afternoon. “That’s important because we want to play here in our ballpark.”
That just wasn’t readily apparent Tuesday night when they lost 4-2 in an otherwise meaningless game against the Los Angeles Angels at Petco Park.
Until Manny Machado’s RBI double in the eighth inning, the Padres had as many hits (two) as Angels catcher Max Stassi had home runs.
The hosts scored only one run after loading the bases with no outs in the first inning. Eric Hosmer’s sacrifice fly was at least more than they mustered in the third inning after again loading the bases with no outs.
Following Jake Cronenworth’s leadoff single in the third inning, Griffin Canning issued his third and fourth walks before Machado grounded into a double play and Hosmer struck out.
No Padres player hit another ball out of the infield until Cronenworth’s deep fly out to center field ended the seventh. They finished with four hits.
Canning, who allowed nine runs (eight earned) and 17 hits in 14 2/3 innings over his previous three starts, got through six innings allowing just the run on two hits.
Other than the home runs to Stassi, a solo shot in the second inning and a two-run blast to center field in the sixth, Zach Davies scattered five hits and three walks over his six innings.
The Angels added a run off Craig Stammen in the eighth.
While an offense that looked hopeless was an unfamiliar sight for the Padres this season, Tuesday essentially felt like all their other September games over the past decade. If for a different reason than the ones that preceded it since 2011, the game really didn’t matter other than to cross it off the calendar and get a few pitchers some work.
The Padres, who clinched their postseason berth on Sunday, will almost certainly end up playing their best-of-three Wild Card Series at Petco Park. Their magic number to clinch the fourth seed is two. The Cardinals (27-25) are the only other team that could take that spot. To do it, even if the Padres went 0-5 the rest of the way, St. Louis would have to go 7-1.
Even without fans allowed at games, the Padres have enjoyed something of a home-field advantage in 2020.
Entering Tuesday, they had a 21-9 record and were averaging 5.4 runs a game at Petco Park. They are 13-11 while averaging 5.8 runs a game on the road. Their OPS (on-base-plus-slugging percentage) at home was .834 compared to .782 on the road.
The Padres talked about how just making the playoffs was not the goal, that Sunday’s fateful victory was but the first phase.
“We know we’ve got 13 more phases to go,” Tingler said that night, referring to the number of postseason victories required to end up World Series champions.
Reflecting on the team’s clinching celebration, Padres General Manager A.J. Preller said he noticed something.
“They enjoyed and appreciated the moment,” he said. “The cooler part is you got the sense that was the first step for this group. They’ve got a belief they can have a good run.”
Perhaps they are just waiting for that run to start.
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