Good morning from Seattle,

The Padres have lost seven of their past 13 games.

And it is not the time to be doing that.

“We’ve got to start playing our best baseball,” Jake Cronenworth said last night after the Padres did not do so in a 5-2 loss to the Mariners.

You can read in my game story (here) about the rough night, which included the Padres being held without a baserunner for 6⅓ innings.

Cronenworth went on to assert that the Padres have been playing well, which is generally true.

And the fact is they weren’t going to sustain the pace they were on coming out of the All-Star break, winning 19 of 22 at one point. The 26-8 record they had from July 20 through Aug. 27 tied the 1989 team for the best 34-game span in history.

You know what that 1989 team was doing in October?

Golfing, fishing, watching the kids. Whatever professional baseball players did in 1989 when their season was over.

Back then, two teams from each league made the playoffs. The 89-73 Padres missed the postseason by three games in ’89.

There are three times as many playoff teams in 2024, and the Padres could possibly even continue on their pace of the past two weeks and make the postseason.

That is not preferable, not what they are thinking. And if it happens, that will be a whole other issue to address.

For now, I’m going to provide some perspective.

Here are the National League wild-card standings:

I will break down the playoff picture — and the Padres’ thoughts on it — in a story that will be posted on our Padres page later today.

Here, let’s just address the worst-case scenario.

The Braves are the team on the outside looking in, and the Padres hold the tiebreaker over them because they won four of their seven meetings this season. That means Atlanta has to finish a game better than the Padres to finish ahead of them.

So consider this:

Bright spot

Tatis ended Bryan Woo’s bid for a perfect game with one out in the seventh inning by turning on a 95 mph fastball on the inner edge and lining it at 115.6 mph down the left field line for his second home run in two days.

“I saw him being aggressive,” Tatis said of Woo, who was ahead of the Padres all night and got through six innings in just 67 pitches. “I told myself I’ve got to be more aggressive than him. I didn’t … see him throwing (many) breaking balls. So on the third at-bat, I went really confident looking for a fastball.”

Fernando Tatis Jr. – San Diego Padres (16)
pic.twitter.com/ni2uL3XsBZ

— MLB HR Videos (@MLBHRVideos) September 12, 2024

It was Tatis’ second-hardest ball in play this season, trailing only a 116.7 mph single on March 21 against the Dodgers in South Korea.

Tatis later made his second excellent play in the outfield in two days when he ran back to the wall and leaped to get his glove above it and rob Randy Arozarena of a home run in the bottom of the seventh.

Nando hits homers and takes them away pic.twitter.com/yEaaL7NOnV

— Talking Friars (@TalkingFriars) September 12, 2024

“I saw it off the bat,” Tatis said. “I knew it’s gonna be a close one, and I just let my abilities play.”

He and Arozarena spoke briefly on the field as Tatis jogged back to the dugout.

“We were laughing because Julio robbed me of one,” Tatis said. “And I said, ‘I wanted Julio, but I’m sorry it was your turn.’”

Here is a look at the Tatis drive that Julio Rodríguez caught last year.

Fernando Tatis Jr. started his home run trot.

Julio Rodriguez makes no reaction, until he starts to smile, and show the Mariners crowd the ball.

What a SHOW 😃 😂 pic.twitter.com/8hvdHw3MP7

— Seattle Mariners ON Tap (@MarinersONTap) August 9, 2023

Tidbits

• You can read in my pregame story (here) about the move to send catcher Luis Campusano to Triple-A yesterday, which gives Elías Díaz more playing time in an effort to see if he is as viable an option for the postseason roster as many in the organization believe he is. Also in that story is news about other transactions.
• Luis Arraez singled in the eighth inning to finish 1-for-4 and extend his hitting streak to 10 games. He is batting .442 (19-for-43) during the streak.
• Jurickson Profar extended his on-base streak to 10 games with a double and Cronenworth extended his on-base streak to seven games with a walk.
• Adrián Morejón allowed two runs on a pair of walks, a wild pitch and a double in last night’s sixth inning. The 25-year-old left-hander has allowed at least one run in eight of his past 19 appearances, a span in which his ERA has swelled from 2.18 to 3.10.

All right, that’s it for me.

No game today, so the next newsletter will be in your inbox Saturday morning.