Wild Card Race Heats Up: Padres vs. Mariners Series Opener

What do the Padres and Mariners have in common? Neither has ever won the World Series.

Both are in wild-card contention in their respective leagues this year, though, as they meet in a series opener on Tuesday night from the Pacific Northwest, with the Padres as short favorites on the MLB odds.

San Diego Padres -108

The Padres come off losing two straight home games to the Giants, dropping the finale 7-6 on Sunday. NL Rookie of the Year favorite Jackson Merrill went 1-for-3 with a solo home run, a walk and two runs scored. Merrill took Spencer Bivens deep in the fifth to finally get the Padres on the board, and later scored again in the seventh on a wild pitch. The home run was his third in six starts this month, and he’s now second on the team in home runs and RBI, trailing Manny Machado in both categories. For the year, Merrill is slashing .290/.322/.499 with 23 homers, 83 RBI, 72 runs and 16 steals.

Jackson Merrill

Merrill’s 83 RBI have broken Benito Santiago’s 79 RBI in 1987 for the most by a Padres’ rookie in a season. Merrill’s 23 homers only trail Nate Colbert (24 in 1969) and Hunter Renfroe (26 in 2017) in Padres rookie history. Merrill’s 4.4 WAR (per Fangraphs) leads all MLB rookies.

Mike Shildt

The Manager said Sunday that starting shortstop Ha-Seong Kim is “not as close as we’d like” to returning. Working his way back from right shoulder inflammation, Kim felt continued discomfort Saturday when he attempted to ramp up his throwing. Shildt described it as “not necessarily a setback,” but “it just wasn’t a move forward.” The team initially had hoped Kim would need just a minimum stay on the 10-day injured list, but he’s already missed three weeks of action and doesn’t appear close to returning.

Xander Bogaerts

The situation has the Padres re-evaluating their options at shortstop, one of which is returning Bogaerts to his old position. Bogaerts has said he’d like to stay at second base now that he’s become comfortable there, but has been open to a move back to shortstop if it meant getting Donovan Solano’s bat in the lineup. Bogaerts moved to shortstop mid-game Sunday versus the Giants after the Padres pinch-hit for shortstop Mason McCoy when they were trailing by five runs at the time. Bogaerts hit a two-run homer Sunday in the loss. McCoy hasn’t been hitting.

Xander Bogaerts Could Move Back To Shortstop https://t.co/YG6bjG3o5W

— RotoBaller MLB (@RotoBallerMLB) September 9, 2024

Since the All-Star break, the Padres have been the best team in baseball, even with those back-to-back losses to the Giants. “Flush these two losses,” said Bogaerts. “Then refocus for Tuesday.” Also since the break, Padres batters have scored the 3rd-most runs per game of any MLB team (5.24), behind just the Yankees (5.25) and D-backs (6.26).

Yu Darvish

It’s veteran righty scheduled on the mound Tuesday. Darvish (4-3, 3.51 ERA) did not factor into the decision in an extra-inning win over the Tigers last Wednesday, allowing three runs on four hits and two walks over 2.2 innings while striking out four. Darvish had a hard time getting through Detroit’s lineup right from the jump, giving up a solo homer to Matt Vierling with two outs in the first before needing 47 pitches to get through the first two frames. He would be relieved by Yuki Matsui with two outs in the third, marking his shortest outing of the campaign — though that was somewhat expected in Darvish’s first start since late May after missing time with an elbow injury and personal reasons.

“Stuff was great,” said Shildt of Darvish’s return. “He was 95 [mph] coming out easy, secondary pitches looked like they were there. As you can expect, first time back in a big league game, there can be a little bit of just-missing. I thought the ball came out well. He said he felt good, arm felt good, body felt good. He just knocked a little bit of the proverbial rust off.”

Darvish is 7-4 with a 3.57 ERA in 15 career outings vs. Seattle, and last faced the Mariners in 2023. ^  

Seattle Mariners -123

Seattle (73-71) is currently on the outside looking in for the AL playoff field, but not by much, both in the AL West and for a wild-card spot. The M’s got a big win on Sunday, 10-4 in St. Louis, to take that series and conclude a long road trip. The Mariners finished with 13 total hits, marking the fourth time in their past five games that they’ve had more than 10, each of which yielded wins. Players have mostly tied the recent hitting hot streak back to new hitting coach Edgar Martinez. When Martinez took over as Mariners hitting coach a little over two weeks ago, he made it clear that his most paramount emphasis would be on simplicity.

“He’s somebody that had done it at the highest level against the best competition,” M’s star Julio Rodríguez said. “And he was a DH who was a really smart hitter, and it’s something that I feel like we all appreciate.”

Randy Arozarena

Hea went 2-for-5 with a two-run homer and two runs scored in Sunday’s win. Arozarena singled and scored a run in the first inning before ripping a two-run shot in the second. After going deep just once in his first 25 games as a Mariner, he’s belted three home runs over his last 12 contests. During that stretch, he’s gone 14-for-47 (.298) with nine RBI. For the year, Arozarena is slashing .221/.332/.396 with 47 extra-base hits and 71 runs scored through 137 games.

Luke Raley

Raley also stayed hot by going 2-for-4 with two doubles, two RBI, two runs scored and a walk. He’s smacked four doubles over his last four games and has produced six multi-hit performances in his last 19 appearances. During that stretch, Raley has gone 16-for-54 (.296) with nine extra-base hits. – The Mariners are 48-4 when they score 5+ runs in a game, best such record in MLB. Seattle is 25-67 when scoring 4-or-fewer runs.

George Kirby

It’s righty on the mound Tuesday. Kirby (11-10) picked up the win over Oakland last Wednesday, allowing two runs on six hits over six innings while striking out nine. Kirby surrendered one run in the opening frame after giving up back-to-back hits to start the inning. However, he would then go on to strike out eight of the next 11 batters he faced in the contest en route to posting just his second quality start since July 26 against the White Sox. Kirby recorded his second-highest strikeout total of the season while securing his third win in his last four decisions.

It was an excellent effort to start September after posting a 6.84 ERA in August. He’ll take a 3.61 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, and a 162/21 K/BB ratio across 167 innings into Tuesday. The Mariners have a franchise record 5 pitchers with at least 18 games started and a sub-4.00 ERA. The Seattle pitching staff has produced 85 quality starts this season, the most by the franchise since 2015 (88).

Kirby is 0-1 with a 12.27 ERA in one career start vs. San Diego.

Padres at Mariners Info

When: Tuesday, 9:40 PM ET
Where: T-Mobile Park
Pitchers (away/home): Yu Darvish/George Kirby
TV: MLB Extra Innings
Stream/game day audio: https://www.mlb.com/live-stream-games/

MLB Betting Center

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