Even as the Padres once again demonstrated their greatest virtue, their greatest weakness showed up.
You can read in my game story (here) about how the Padres fell behind by five runs yesterday and almost came all the way back before losing 7-6 to the Marlins.
The sole loss on their six-game road trip was completed only after an apparent home run by Ha-Seong Kim with two outs in the ninth inning was overturned.
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And, yes, Dylan Cease had an off day. And so did the defense.
But those are not recurring issues.
Middle relievers surrendering crucial runs is.
The Padres were within a run, at 5-4 in yesterday’s seventh inning, when Yuki Matsui gave up a two-run homer.
The Padres relievers charged with not letting little deficits become big ones have failed time and again.
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If you weren’t appreciative before this trip for what A.J. Preller was able to perpetrate at the trade deadline, you weren’t paying attention. If you’re not appreciative now, you must be a Dodgers fan.
It could be argued that as many as five of the Padres’ seven consecutive victories from Saturday to Saturday could have/would have been losses if not for Preller having acquired some combination of Jason Adam, Bryan Hoeing and Tanner Scott at the deadline.
As has been noted in this space — and by some players — the Padres would be well served to score early and/or often and not have to keep coming back to win games. Further, they have gotten just two quality starts in their past 12 games.
These tight contests are forcing their bullpen to work overtime. And the reality is, while winning four straight games by coming back in the final two innings is impressive, it is also a little bit lucky.
They won those games with big hits and a retooled bullpen, not to mention a couple fine plays by Manny Machado. But they were preilously close to losing all of them as well.
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All this to say, as good as the Padres have been, they have some things to tighten up.
Update, flashback
Here is the state of the National League wild-card race:
You want another reason to appreciate what happened at the trade deadline?
You might recall it was not that long ago that a Padres team cratered at this point in the season.
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Three years ago yesterday, the Padres dropped the finale of a series against the Marlins after winning the first two games. The Padres were 16 games above .500 and sat in the second of what were at the time two wild-card playoff spots, 4½ games ahead of the Reds.
What ensued was one the worst collapses in the history of Major League Baseball, as the Padres closed with a 12-34 record to finish the season 79-83. Just three times since the formation of the American Association in 1882 had a team with a winning record with 46 games to play have a worse record than the 12-34 mark the Padres posted.
There were myriad issues with that ’21 team that are not present this year.
The biggest problem — by far — that season was a lack of pitching depth. The rotation was hit by a rash of injuries, the bullpen was overworked, and the trade deadline provided no real reinforcements.
So that the Padres feel good enough about their starting rotation that they sent Randy Vásquez to Triple-A on Saturday and have the aforementioned new bullpen pieces should be the biggest comforts when pondering this season’s final 43 games.
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Cease’s struggle
Cease wasn’t blaming his subpar start yesterday on his truncated start Tuesday.
After allowing the Marlins five runs (two earned) in the first two innings, Cease said he wasn’t rusty as a result of rain having cut short his start five days earlier in Pittsburgh after one inning and 14 pitches.
“I don’t think so,” he said. “I got good practice in. I think it was just one of those games. … I felt good going into it. I just wasn’t quite as crisp as I have been.”
Cease ended up completing five innings without any further damage, which did allow the Padres to chip away at a fixed deficit.
Even now, Cease has a 1.33 ERA over his past seven starts (40⅔ innings).
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For all his excellence, however, yesterday was not entirely an anomaly. It was the fourth start this season in which he has allowed five or more runs in five or fewer innings.
Reynolds makes it to Miami
Hoeing and Scott, who the Padres got from the Marlins on July 30, spent portions of the weekend catching up with former teammates.
Yesterday, Sean Reynolds joined them, talking and laughing before the game with Marlins coaches and former minor-league teammates.
Then he went out and faced the team that drafted him in 2016 as a first baseman and moved him to pitcher in 2021.
“The journey to get to that mound was pretty incredible and definitely not how I saw my first time pitching in that stadium unfolding,” he said.
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Reynolds, who was in Triple-A when he was acquired by the Padres along with Garrett Cooper at last year’s trade deadline, made his major league debut for the Padres on July 14. He was optioned July 28 and recalled yesterday, arriving in Miami a few hours before the game.
He worked a scoreless sixth inning, stranding a runner at third by striking out the final two batters, before yielding a single at the start of the seventh and being replaced by Matsui.
Round 3?
Machado struck out to end the eighth inning in consecutive games against Aroldis Chapman last week in Pittsburgh.
The first one ended on a 105 mph sinker than Chapman threw to the inside edge of the strike zone, freezing Machado, who then shook his head and grinned as Chapman looked back at him smiling.
Manny Machado was left speechless by this Aroldis Chapman 104.7 MPH fastball 😮 pic.twitter.com/w8opxiHUIO
“He dotted that 105,” Machado said before leaving Pittsburgh. “I mean, you gotta give your respect to that. I mean … there’s nothing you can do with that pitch right there.”
In their faceoff Thursday, Chapman got ahead with two splitters, one of them a called strike on a pitch up and away. Then he missed with a 101 mph sinker and Machado fouled off a 103 mph sinker before swinging over a splitter.
“That was tough (Wednesday),” Machado said. “And then he came (Thursday) and threw me a couple splits — one that was off the zone. But whatever, I’ll get my rematch next week.”
Next week is now. The Pirates are at Petco Park the next three days.
Tidbits
Jackson Merrill was 0-for-4 yesterday, bringing an end to his hitting streak after six games. But he reached on a fielder’s choice and scored in a seventh consecutive game.
Luis Arraez was 3-for-4 and has eight hits in 20 at-bats during a four-game hitting streak.
David Peralta was 1-for-4 with a double and two RBIs. He is 7-for-16 with three doubles during a four-game hitting streak.
A day after he stranded two inherited runners and went on to work 2⅓ scoreless innings, Jhony Brito was optioned to Triple-A. The Padres needed to fortify the bullpen, so Reynolds was recalled.
Joe Musgrove will make his first start since May 26 tonight. I wrote yesterday (here) about some alterations Musgrove has made in his delivery to alleviate stress on his elbow.
All right, that’s it for me. Early flight this morning and then a Musgrove Monday night.
Plenty of financial and regulatory hurdles still need to be cleared, but a fuels pipeline project that may lead to lower gas prices in San Diego and Southern California has received a healthy amount of interest from other companies.
Phillips 66 and Kinder Morgan have proposed building what they’ve dubbed the Western Gateway Pipeline that would use a combination of existing infrastructure plus new construction to establish a corridor for refined products that would stretch 1,300 miles from St. Louis to California.
If completed, one leg of the pipeline would be the first to deliver motor fuels into California, a state often described as a fuel island that is disconnected from refining hubs in the U.S.
The two companies recently announced the project “has received significant interest” from shippers and investors from what’s called an “open season” that wrapped up on Dec. 19 — so much so that a second round will be held this month for remaining capacity.
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“That’s a strong indicator that people would be willing to commit to put volume on that pipeline to bring it west long enough for them to be able to pay off their investment and provide a return for their investors,” said David Hackett, president of Stillwater Associates, a transportation energy consulting company in Irvine. “They won’t build this thing on spec. They’ll need commitments from shippers to do this.”
The plans for the Western Gateway Pipeline include constructing a new line from the Texas Panhandle town of Borger to Phoenix. Meanwhile, the flow on an existing pipeline that currently runs from the San Bernardino County community of Colton to Arizona would be reversed, allowing more fuel to remain in California.
The entire pipeline system would link refinery supply from the Midwest to Phoenix and California, while also providing a connection into Las Vegas.
The proposed route for the Western Gateway Pipeline, a project announced by Phillips 66 and Kinder Morgan designed to bring refined products like gasoline to states such as Arizona and keep more supplies within California. (Phillips 66)
A spokesperson for Kinder Morgan told the Union-Tribune in October that there are no plans for the project to construct any new pipelines in California and the proposal “should put downward pressure” on prices at the pump.
“With no new builds in California and using pipelines currently in place, it’s an all-around win-win — good for the state and consumers,” Kinder Morgan’s director of corporate communications, Melissa D. Ruiz, said in an email.
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The second round of “open season” will include offerings of new destinations west of Colton that would allow Western Gateway shippers access to markets in Los Angeles.
Even with sufficient investor support, the project would still have to go through an extensive regulatory and permitting process that would undoubtedly receive pushback from environmental groups.
Should the pipeline get built, Hackett said it’s hard to predict what it would mean at the pump for Southern California drivers. But he said the project could ensure more fuel inventory remains inside California, thus reducing reliance on foreign imports, especially given potential political tensions in the South China Sea.
“I’d much rather have our gas come from Texas or Missouri than from Asia, at least from a geopolitical strategic standpoint,” Hackett said.
This past summer, Reuters reported that California’s fuel imports hit their highest levels in four years.
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About 70% of the imports — roughly 187,000 barrels per day — came from South Korea and other Asian countries that have long been top trading partners for California and other states along the West Coast, according to Kpler, an international firm that tracks global shipping and trade.
Fuel supplies and gasoline prices have received greater focus in the wake of a pair of refinery closures in California.
Phillips 66 planned to shutter operations at its twin refinery in the Los Angeles area by the close of 2025, and Valero is scheduled to close down its 145,000-barrel-per-day facility in the Northern California city of Benicia in April. The Valero and Phillips 66 facilities combine to account for about 18% of the state’s crude oil capacity.
The average price for a gallon of gasoline is higher in California than in any other state in the continental U.S., according to AAA.
On Tuesday, the average price in the Golden State was $4.254 while the national average came to $2.815. Hawaii had the highest average in the country, at $4.423 per gallon.
The city of San Diego has filed a lawsuit against the federal government that alleges the construction of a razor wire fence near the U.S.-Mexico border constitutes trespassing on city property and has caused environmental harm to the land.
The complaint filed Monday in San Diego federal court states that razor wire fencing being constructed by U.S. Marines in the Marron Valley area has harmed protected plant and wildlife habitats and that the presence of federal personnel there represents unpermitted trespassing.
The lawsuit, which names the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Department of Defense among its defendants, says that city officials first discovered the presence of Marines and federal employees in the area in December.
The fencing under construction has blocked city officials from accessing the property to assess and manage the land, and the construction efforts have” caused and will continue to cause property damage and adverse environmental impacts,” according to the lawsuit.
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The suit seeks an injunction ordering the defendants to cease and desist from any further trespass or construction in the area.
“The city of San Diego will not allow federal agencies to disregard the law and damage city property,” City Attorney Heather Ferbert said in a statement. “We are taking decisive action to protect sensitive habitats, uphold environmental commitments and ensure that the rights and resources of our community are respected.”
Padres roster review: Sung-Mun song – San Diego Union-Tribune
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SUNG-MUN SONG
Position(s): Third base, second base
Bats / Throws: Left / Right
2026 opening day age: 29
Height / Weight: 6-foot / 194 pounds
How acquired: Signed as a free agent in December 2025
Contract status: A four-year, $15 million deal will see Song make $2.5 million in 2026, $3 million in 2027, $3.5 million in 2028 and $4 million in 2029 if he does not opt out of last year; Half of his $1 million signing bonus is due in January 2026 and the other half in 2027; There is a $7 million mutual option for 2030.
.214 — Song’s isolated power in 2025, a career high as he prepared for a jump to the majors. Isolated power measures a player’s raw power (extra bases per at-bat) and Song had a .190 OPS in 2018, in his third year as a pro in Korea, before it dropped to .101 in 2019 and then a career-low .095 in 2023. Hitting 19 homers pushed Song’s isolated power to .178 in 2024 and then a career-high 26 homers push it even higher in 2025.
TRENDING
Idle — Drafted by the Heroes in 2014, Song debuted in the KBO the following year but didn’t become a regular until 2019. A drop-off in production — he had an .884 OPS in 78 games in 2018 and a .597 OPS in 103 games in 2019 — was followed by losing the 2020 season and a chunk of the 2021 season to military service obligations. Then three straight sub-.700 OPS seasons forced Song to rethink his approach to professional baseball, especially in the face of the likes of Ha-Seong Kim,Jung Hoo Lee and Hyeseong Kim generating big-league buzz. Song started with weight training and nutrition. A hitting coach also helped him with balance, pull-side power and the ability to catch up with the sort of fastballs that seem to dog Korean players when they arrive in the States. It all added up to a breakthrough year in which Song paired 19 homers, 104 RBIs and 21 steals with a .340/.409/.518 batting line. To prove it was no fluke, Song followed up his 2024 season with another strong effort that solidified his wish to try his hand in the majors. The ensuing, four-year, $15 million deal that Song signed with the Padres in December cost his new employer a $3 million posting fee to be paid to the Kiwoom Heroes.
2026 OUTLOOK
Like Kim before him, Song appears to be joining the Padres as a utility player with the hope that he blossoms into more as he gets comfortable in a new country and league. Song had experience in Korea at third base (500 starts), second base (149 starts) and first base (38 starts). Padres president of baseball operations A.J. Preller even mentioned outfield reps in passing as he assessed how Song could help the Padres in 2026.
Former KBO player Sung-Mun Song shakes hands with Padres vice president of amateur and international scouting Pete DeYoung after signing a contract with the San Diego Padres at Petco Park on Saturday. (Photo by Armond Feffer/San Diego Padres)
