Padres Stun Dodgers, Take NL West Lead Before Crucial Showdown
Six weeks ago, it looked like the San Diego Padres were all but out of the NL West race. They’d stumbled through a rough road trip, dropping both series in Cincinnati and Philadelphia. Meanwhile, the Dodgers were cruising — nine games ahead in the standings after beating the White Sox. At that point, the division title wasn’t even a thought for the Padres. As Manny Machado put it, “We weren’t really looking up. We were just trying to get back in the win column.”
Well, they’ve been in that win column plenty since. In the span of a month and a half, San Diego not only erased that massive gap but now sits alone in first place after a three-game sweep of the Giants, capped by an 11–1 blowout, paired with a Dodgers loss to the Angels. The Padres have gone 23–12 over that stretch, while the Dodgers have stumbled to a 12–21 record. That’s a ten-game swing — enough to put Los Angeles in the role of the chaser for the first time all season.
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The turnaround didn’t just happen on its own. At the trade deadline, the Padres went all in, pulling off five deals involving 22 players. Mason Miller was brought in to make an already elite bullpen nearly unhittable, while Ryan O’Hearn, Ramón Laureano, and Freddy Fermin gave a once-thin lineup surprising depth. That bottom-third of the order, which had been the weakest in baseball, is now producing like a strength.
Meanwhile, Michael King and Yu Darvish have returned to bolster the starting rotation, and manager Mike Shildt suddenly has the luxury of mixing and matching dominant arms late in games. The Dodgers’ bullpen, on the other hand, has been anything but steady, blowing multiple late leads in recent weeks.
This sets up a huge stretch — three games in L.A. this weekend, then another three at Petco Park the following weekend. The Dodgers still hold the season series edge, which could matter in a tiebreaker, but this is the deepest into a season the Padres have held first place since 2010. And they haven’t won the division since 2006.
Fernando Tatis Jr. says the team’s approach is simple: “We’re going out there confident every single day, playing good baseball, clean baseball. That’s what we’re capable of.” Machado echoed that, crediting the smooth adjustment of the newcomers and the leadership of the team’s core stars.
The Dodgers still have Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, and Freddie Freeman — elite talent that can flip a postseason series in a heartbeat. But right now, the edge in momentum, depth, and bullpen dominance belongs to San Diego. The next ten days might just decide the NL West. Six weeks ago, nobody could have predicted that. Now, it’s in the Padres’ hands.
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