Good morning from San Francisco,

There is a lot to talk about today.

The No.8 hitter getting four hits, including three doubles.

The new No.5 hitter hitting two doubles.

Two starters in a row pitching like the dominant versions of themselves.

We will get to those things and more.

First, let’s talk about what all that could conceivably end up leading to.

It has been mentioned in previous newsletters that the Padres have internally never stopped believing it was possible to win the National League West.

But it was also suggested here just yesterday that it might be better for Padres fans to root for the Dodgers against the Braves this weekend because that would help assure the Padres a playoff spot.

Well, the Dodgers lost to the Braves for the second straight night, and the Padres beat the Giants for the second straight night. That left the Padres 3½ games behind the Dodgers in the NL West.

The Padres have 13 games remaining, the Dodgers 14. The Padres have already clinched the season series against the Dodgers, meaning they hold the tiebreaker should they finish with identical records. The teams play the week after next, Sept. 24-26, in Los Angeles.

The Dodgers are essentially trying out starting pitchers, as they have been beset by injuries. They are have lost six of their past nine games and have been outscored by 22 runs in that span.

“We’re chasing right down their backs right now,” Joe Musgrove said last night. “They’re physically not where they want to be, but that’s how it goes. I mean, we lost plenty of guys throughout the course of the season and managed to stay above water and keep ourselves in position. So, you know, it’s just how baseball goes at times. You lose key players. But we’re playing really good baseball right now. Our confidence is high, the approach is right on both sides of the baseball. So I think we’re in a really good spot to make a push of this thing. But I don’t think it changes a whole lot of how we play. I think we still are out there with the intention to win every game and do what the game’s telling us we need to do, and then just see where things fall.”

It remains a tall wall to scale, though it seems more scalable than it did just a couple days ago.

So instead of the chart I have updated a few times showing what it would take for the Braves to overtake the Padres, here is a new chart showing what it will take for the Dodgers to fend off the Padres and win the NL West.

Starting to look good

Musgrove last night got back to being the guy who had the Padres flashing back to the 2022 playoffs, as they envisioned him being that tone-setting pitcher heading into October.

You can read in my game story (here) about how he pitched the first six innings of the Padres’ second consecutive shutout of the Giants.

Take away 10 pitches from Musgrove’s start a week ago — that practically unfathomable stretch in the fourth inning when the Giants hit virtually everything he threw and scored six runs in a span of six batters — and Musgrove has a 0.95 ERA and has allowed a .159 batting average over 38 innings since coming back from the injured list on Aug. 12. (With that disastrous half-dozen at-bats, he still has a 2.37 ERA and has allowed just a .196 batting average in those seven starts.)

That he followed up what Dylan Cease did Friday night, throwing six scoreless innings to pull out of a month-long funk, is just about the best-case scenario for the Padres with a playoff berth to clinch and a postseason run to embark on after that.

“Our starters are starting to get deeper into games and putting up quality start after quality start,” Musgrove said. “Obviously, if we can get to the sixth inning with the lead, our bullpen is damn near unhittable.”

That has almost been the case the past two nights, as the Giants have one hit against five different Padres relievers. And, in fact, the bullpen’s .181 average allowed in 20 games since Aug. 23 is third best in the major leagues.

No.8 in your scorebook …

Donovan Solano, who was so crucial to the Padres treading water earlier in the season, is back in the lineup.

And he is hitting again.

Solano went 4-for-6 with three doubles last night and is 6-for-11 in his three starts this week.

This followed a month (Aug. 8 through Sept. 8) in which he started just seven of the Padres’ 30 games and batted .167 (7-for-42) with a .565 OPS.

To that point, he had been hitting .314 with a .789 OPS, performing well (.303/.346/.423) in 48 starts at third base, first base and designated hitter and coming through off the bench (7-for-16).

“It’s not easy doing that role,” Manny Machado said. “And he’s perfected it. Not only that, but he’s come out and when we needed him to start or carry the team for a couple days, he’s done it. He’s done the job. Those games are big games for us, and it puts us in the position we are in today, that we’re that much closer to reaching our goal. It’s gonna take all of us, and this year he’s a big part of it.”

Solano has not denied that it is easier to maintain a rhythm at the plate when playing regularly, but he reiterated last night that sporadic playing time cannot be an excuse.

“It’s part of my job,” he said. “I need to deal with this. This is a great team. I am happy to be part of the winning.”

It seems Solano will be a regular for as long as Ha-Seong Kim remains sidelined by a shoulder injury. Kim played catch yesterday but has not tried anything close to a full-strength throw across in more than a week.

Correction, update

Jackson Merrill hit two more doubles last night. So I get a chance to get a chart correct that I messed up yesterday. (I wrote the right numbers in the body of the newsletter but then jumbled them up in the chart I included.)

So, here is an updated chart reflecting Merrill being one of seven rookies age 21 or younger to ever have at least 27 doubles, six triples and 23 home runs. I added an asterisk next to the names of the Hall of Famers.

I also alluded yesterday to where Merrill bats in the Padres’ lineup, explaining why he had not moved up but saying it could happen at any time.

And Voilà! Merrill was moved up to the No.5 spot in the batting order last night. It wasn’t the first time he had batted there. It was the third. This time felt more permanent, and after he went 2-for-5 with the two doubles and a pair of RBIs, it would seem there is no reason to see this as anything but a positive.

You can read my pregame story (here) on the move.

Trending back up

Jurickson Profar was 1-for-2 with three walks last night.

He is batting .323 (10-for-31) during an eight-game hitting streak, and he is reaching base at a .439 clip during a 12-game on-base streak.

This follows a 22-game stretch in which he batted .185 (15-for-81) with a .302 on-base percentage.

The 31-year-old Profar, who leads the National League with a .384 OBP, has played the second-most innings in his 11-year career. He has done so while working through occasional flare-ups of the patellar tendinitis in his left knee.

One such instance was for an extended period last month, and on many days he spent more time getting treatment than in the batting cage.

“By dealing with that I (did) not swing a lot,” he said recently. “Because I was in the training room, working in the gym, maybe taking 10 swings and ready for the game. … Now it’s feeling good because of the hard work the trainers did and myself.”

Now, Profar did leave the clubhouse limping after fouling a ball of his foot in his final plate appearance last night. Brandon Lockridge replaced Profar in left field the final two innings and could get his first start today.

More like it

The Padres are 7-3 and have clinched the season series against the Dodgers. They have split their 10 games with the Diamondbacks and have a chance to finish with a winning record against them when they meet in the final series of the regular season.

But they finished 5-8 against the last-place Rockies (57-92) and entered this series having won just four of the 10 meetings with the fourth-place Giants (72-77).

After taking the first two games this weekend, a win today would clinch the season series.

Save for the Rockies and a slip-up against the Angels in June, the Padres have done so much better against teams they should beat in 2024.

After starting the season 13-19 against teams that are currently .500 or worse, the Padres have won 26 of their past 32 games against such teams. (That includes going 3-3 against the Rockies.)

Tidbits

• Luis Arraez went 2-for-6 last night to extend his hitting streak to 12 games, a season-high for him and the third-longest active streak in the major leagues. Arraez is batting .453 (24-for-53) during the run.
• It has been 29 games (135 plate appearances) since Arraez struck out. That is the longest streak in the major leagues since Juan Pierre went 147 plate appearances without a strikeout in 2004.  (Tony Gwynn holds the Padres record at 170 plate appearances in 1995).
• Machado was 2-for-5 and drove in two runs last night. The Padres improved to 26-0 when he has multiple RBIs this season.
• Fernando Tatis Jr. was 3-for-6 last night and is 7-for-19 over the past four games.
• Xander Bogaerts hit a home run last night and has three of them in his past 47 at-bats. Before this stretch, he had one home run in his previous 108 at-bats.
• The seven doubles the Padres hit last night were their most in a game since Aug. 15, 2023.
• The Padres’ 17 hits last night were their fifth most in a game this season. They have had at least 10 hits in 65 games this season. That is tied with 1982 and ‘87 for sixth most in team history. The team record is 78 such games in 1996.
• The Padres scored in the first inning last night for the fifth time in their past eight games and 15th time in their past 33 games. They had done so in just seven of their previous 46 games.
• Last night’s victory got the Padres to 19 games above .500 for the third time this season (and third time in their past nine games). No Padres team has been 20 games over since the 2010 squad was 87-67.

All right, that’s it for me.

Talk to you tomorrow.

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