Manny Machado hit a ball 106.7 mph in the eighth inning of NLDS Game 4 with his team down two runs. In most ballparks, on most nights, that ball lands in the seats and the game is tied.
Garrett Mitchell caught it at the top of the wall. Milwaukee won 3-1 at Petco Park and San Diego went home.
One Play, One Season
A.J. Preller said it plainly afterward: “I thought Manny’s ball was going out tonight.” He also offered the only honest summary available. “Could have gone either way.”
That is the thing about short series. A center fielder timing a jump correctly is the difference between a tied game in the eighth and a winter of questions about the roster.
Machado did not hide behind the catch. “We had opportunities there,” he said. “We didn’t come up with the clutch hit.” He is right, and the numbers are brutal about it.
Twenty-One Straight Outs to End a Season
Fernando Tatis Jr. homered in the third to tie the game 1-1. That was San Diego’s last hit of the year.
Per OptaSTATS, the Padres went 0-for-21 to finish the season, the longest hitless stretch by a National League team to end a postseason. They were 0-for-2 with runners in scoring position in Game 4 and left the bases loaded in the first inning.
San Diego has now been eliminated in the Division Series or Wild Card round three years running. In the 2024 NLDS they led 2-1 and then lost the next two games by a combined 10-0. In the 2025 Wild Card Series against the Cubs they went 3-for-26 with runners in scoring position.
That stopped being variance a while ago. The pattern points at an offense that disappears the moment the pitching gets better.
The Clubhouse Knows
Craig Stammen framed it the way a veteran does. “We’ve got to find a way to leave no doubt in these series.” Tatis was shorter: “It was a grind.”
San Diego will spend the winter being told it needs more offense, and that is correct but incomplete. The Padres had enough offense to win 90 games. They did not have the kind that holds up for four games against a 102-win team.
Mitchell made a great play. He also only had to make it because nobody behind Machado could put a ball in the outfield.
San Diego has the payroll and the star power to fix this. What it has not found is a way to produce runs in October against the sort of pitching every playoff team brings. Until that changes, the Padres will keep losing games like this one by a single swing.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.