This Final Dodgers Series Will Tell The Story Of The 2025 San Diego Padres

[Randy Holt]

A week ago, the San Diego Padres carried a one-game lead in the National League West into Dodger Stadium, with a chance to solidify their surprising position atop the division ranks. Of course, they were promptly swept and fell back to two games behind the Los Angeles Dodgers. But as we head into the weekend, there’s an opportunity for a serious bit of redemption on the San Diego end of things. On their home field, no less.

Last weekend's sequence injected a bit of panic into the bloodstream in matters of the big picture. The Padres had ridden a combination of an improving offense and a late-summer swoon from the Dodgers to even be in the mix for the division. The sweep left one to wonder if they simply failed to meet the moment or if the Dodgers are, even simpler, a different class of team than San Diego. The trends of 2025 would likely have us believe it's the latter.

Since squandering a 2-1 lead in the National League Division Series to Los Angeles in the 2024 postseason – a stretch in which their offense fell silent for the final two games in consecutive shutout losses – things haven’t been terrific for the Padres against their division rivals. They’ve won only twice in 10 games against the Dodgers thus far in 2025. Worse yet, the offensive production has served as the bulk of the reason for the struggle. The team has averaged 4.3 runs per game against Los Angeles this season, a number which dips to just 3.0 if you remove an 11-run outburst back on June 10.  

So as disappointing as it was that the Padres came out of last weekend's set with a two-game deficit in the NL West, it wasn't terribly surprising. Further pessimism transpired with the Dodgers set to play the Colorado Rockies for four games. How things can change over a four-day span. 

The Padres continued their recent run of success against the San Francisco Giants this week, taking three of four from their even-farther-north-in-California rivals. Los Angeles, meanwhile, split with the Rockies. Both teams managed wins on Thursday, which leaves the Padres just one game behind the Dodgers in the division. That opens up a few different possibilities. 

On the rather dour end of things, another sweep puts the Padres four games back ahead of a series against a Seattle team with which, anecdotally, the Padres seem to struggle against. Such a scenario would reignite the pessimism from early this week and push them just far back enough to shift their focus back toward the wild card. Conversely, grabbing at least a game leaves you two back. That's not an ideal scenario, but it's a manageable one, as the Dodgers possess the tougher schedule in the month of September. It leaves you enough room to climb back in with the right stretch of fortune. Winning the series outright — whether in taking two or via a revenge sweep — puts the Padres firmly in the drivers' seat.

At the same time, scenarios hardly matter when one considers what is required from San Diego to take control of their own narrative this weekend, however. Spoiler alert: it's about the offense.

Looking back at the 2025 calendar, many of the team's roughest stretches are wrought by bouts of ineptitude from the offense; they went 13-15 in June and ranked 24th in the league in runs scored, for example. Fernando Tatis Jr. was a ghost in June and July. Jackson Merrill didn't have a semblance of power until more recently. Luis Arráez and Manny Machado have each hit the highway to woe in August. It's been streakiness mixed with mechanical adjustments mixed with outright struggle while preventing the Padres from truly hitting an offensive stride. 

If ever there was a stretch where they were going to string together a number of collective offensive efforts, it's this one. The Padres are coming off three consecutive games of at least five runs scored. They have Yu Darvish and Nestor Cortes as scheduled starts for the weekend. It has never been more essential that the team does what they do well: navigate their approach appropriate and take advantage of runners in scoring position. When the team has been at its best on offense, it's been those two components. And with some uncertainty out of the gate on the pitching side, they're going to need to maximize the offensive outputs from said components. 

Should they fail to do so, a number of conclusions will start to be drawn about this team, its offense, and its ultimate upside in a potential 2025 postseason bid. If they're able to get themselves sorted in that regard, however, the narrative and the vibe immediately shift. And vibes, while unquantifiable, can do a number for a team this time of year.

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