San Diego built its October formula around handing a lead to a bullpen with no soft landing spots, and the Padres put that plan on full display in their 4-1 Wild Card Series-clinching win over the Cubs at Petco Park.
Nick Pivetta worked 3 1/3 innings, and manager Craig Stammen did not wait for the game to turn. Once Chicago threatened in the fourth, the Padres rolled out Bradgley Rodriguez, Jason Adam, Adrian Morejon and Mason Miller for the final 5 2/3 innings.
Quick facts
- The Padres eliminated Chicago with a 4-1 win in Game 2 of the NL Wild Card Series.
- Rodriguez, Adam, Morejon and Miller held the Cubs scoreless after Pivetta exited.
- Chicago put only three runners aboard against San Diego’s relievers.
- Pete Crow-Armstrong and Alex Bregman went a combined 0-for-15 with eight strikeouts in the series.
- San Diego will face the top-seeded Brewers in the best-of-five NL Division Series, beginning Saturday at 8:30 p.m. ET on FS1, FOX Deportes and FOX One.
The Padres had already set themselves up well when Michael King delivered seven shutout innings in Game 1. That outing kept the high-leverage group fresh, allowing San Diego to treat Wednesday’s game as a sprint once it got ahead.
San Diego scored twice in the second inning. Pivetta later surrendered an RBI single to Nico Hoerner in the fourth, trimming the margin to one, but Gavin Sheets answered in the bottom half with a pinch-hit home run that restored breathing room at 4-1.
“Michael’s effort last night was phenomenal,” Miller said. “It allowed us to come out firing early today and put our best guys in the game. When we have a lead, we feel very good about it.”
Rodriguez inherited the critical fourth-inning work and escaped a bases-loaded situation, protecting Pivetta’s night. The rookie right-hander then posted a clean fifth, finishing it by striking out Seiya Suzuki with a changeup beneath the strike zone.
Pitching coach Ruben Niebla said Rodriguez has carried an unusual calm into pressure assignments all season. “His maturity is beyond his years,” Niebla said. “He doesn’t get rattled or nervous. He believes in himself, and we feel comfortable putting him in those spots.”
Adam handled the sixth with a perfect inning. Morejon took the seventh and eighth, permitting only a Tyrone Taylor single, before Miller entered for the ninth to a full Petco Park production: lights down, Korn’s “Blind” on the speakers and the sellout crowd on its feet.
Miller allowed a Hoerner double but struck out two Cubs and got Carson Kelly on a ground ball to finish the series. The closer ended the regular season with 38 saves, a career-low 1.67 ERA and a 47.4 percent strikeout rate.
For the Padres, the bigger statement came against the top of Chicago’s order. Crow-Armstrong had just completed baseball’s seventh 40-40 season, while Bregman carried a 1.010 OPS after the All-Star break. Neither found room against San Diego pitching.
That is the kind of coverage president of baseball operations A.J. Preller sought when he built this relief corps. “In the postseason, you have to retire a lot of great hitters,” Preller said. “You need plenty of answers in the bullpen.”
The Padres used their bullpen for 683 2/3 innings during the regular season, fourth most in the Majors, and its 3.53 ERA ranked fifth. Adam said the group’s strength is that no inning changes the confidence level.
“It is an incredible group from top to bottom,” Adam said. “The situation and inning do not matter. Whoever gets the ball, I trust that he is going to do his job.”
Miller put the same idea more simply after closing it out. “This isn’t about one person,” he said. “It’s about giving the ball to the next guy and getting back to the clubhouse with a win. There are a lot of selfless guys down there.”
Milwaukee brings another deep relief staff into the Division Series, but San Diego heads north with its preferred blueprint already tested: get the lead, shorten the game and let the bullpen take over. Niebla said the staff knew it could cover six innings. On Wednesday night, it did exactly that.
