As the best wildcard team in the NL, the Padres have their fate in their own hands.

A little more flexibility would be nice.

Dylan Cease gave up an early lead and a starting lineup missing Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jackson Merrill wasted one chance after another in a 6-3 loss to the Giants on Saturday, which cost the Padres a prime opportunity to improve their postseason position.

After all, the Diamondbacks lost three games in a row, only to watch the Padres give up their lead and lose for the second time in three days.

The Padres still have a 1½-game lead over Arizona in the race for the NL’s top wild-card spot, but the race is as tight as ever: The Mets, who have won nine games in a row, have overtaken the Braves and moved into the third wild-card spot, a half-game behind Arizona and two games behind the Padres.

“You can’t worry too much about the other teams,” second baseman Xander Bogaerts said. “I keep saying it. Why? You just waste energy on things you can’t control, and sometimes you want to do a little too much when you look at the scoreboard.”

“We missed a big opportunity today, but we’ll be back here in a few hours and have a good chance of a good series win.”

That hit was within reach until Yuki Matsui allowed Grant McCray’s second home run in the ninth inning.

That’s why it’s all the more frustrating to leave seven runners on the field and allow three double plays, even with Tatis taking the day off and Merrill out with a bruised left knee.

Of course, the sinkerball-hitting Webb got all three double kills, and the Giants’ alternate bullpen got the final nine outs, even though Tatis had opened the ninth with a pinch-hit double against closer Ryan Walker.

Merrill was grounded out as a pinch hitter, Donovan Solano flied out to center – also as a pinch hitter – and Luis Arraez flied out to left, leaving Tatis standing at second base, a loss that prevented the Padres from extending their wild card lead.

“We caught (Webb) early,” Padres manager Mike Shildt said. “Baess was well-positioned, was able to score a couple of points, but couldn’t add anything. We caught one in the fifth inning and he was throwing the balls. He’s a veteran player, so he kept the ball down and we got a couple of good hits on him and just couldn’t add much.”

If only.

Finally, Webb was on the outs when Arraez started a three-hit game with a single and Jurickson Profar followed with a single of his own. Jake Cronenworth then worked a walk to load the bases and Manny Machado hit a single to center to score the game’s first run.

A good start, for sure.

But Bogaerts’ ensuing grounder to second base left him with two outs for a run, and the Padres settled for just two runs after loading all the bases to start the game against last year’s NL Cy Young runner-up.

The Padres scored another run in the fifth inning on Arraez’s third hit of the game, but still regretted the missed opportunities from Saturday’s game.

Cronenworth hit an inning-ending double play in the second inning, Bogaerts loaded the bases with a bouncer to shortstop in the fifth inning, and Mason McCoy’s comebacker in the sixth inning allowed Webb to hit an inning-ending double play with two bases on base in a 4-3 game.

Webb allowed 10 hits, but only Tyler Wade’s fifth-inning double brought extra bases. He struck out three and walked two, getting off to a good start.

“The good thing is we’re playing baseball tomorrow,” Bogarts said. “We can make up for what we did today. We obviously didn’t play our best game and I left way too many guys on the bases. It’s a frustrating night.”

Cease went six innings for only the second time since his July 25 no-hitter, but he wasn’t particularly fit until he struck out the last seven batters he faced.

By that point, he had already allowed the Giants to take a 2-0 lead on McCray’s three-run home run in the third inning and extend their lead in the fourth inning with the help of walks on McCray’s double play with the bases loaded.

Cease struck out 61 of his 101 pitches, allowed six hits, walked two and struck out four times.

The home run he allowed to McCray on a middle-middle slider was the first he has allowed since Aug. 17, but he also has a 5.01 ERA in his last six starts.

“It wasn’t great, especially at the beginning,” Cease said. “But I fought, but in the end it wasn’t good enough.”

McCray, 23, hit a two-run homer in the ninth inning against Matsui to turn a 4-3 lead into a three-run lead, dampening the prospect of any heroics in the bottom half of the inning.

Tatis hit a double to right on the first pitch he saw from Walker, but Merrill threw a groundout to third base on the first pitch he saw, which can be considered a positive development in this loss.

Merrill had made enough progress to start at bat. He declined to speak to reporters as he headed to the training room for further treatment, but Shildt remained optimistic that the Padres’ NL Rookie of the Year candidate could return to the lineup on Sunday.

“I’m still evaluating it tonight, but I’m optimistic about the future,” Shildt said. “Definitely a good sign. He and Tati were both pretty much in the role they were in tonight. You know, kind of an emergency, kind of batting run. They both had their heads in their heads, good teammates, tough guys. You know, you win with tough guys and we have a lot of them.”

Originally published: September 7, 2024 at 20:07