Behind Fernando Tatis Jr., Padres Prove They Can Hit Their Way Through Postseason

[Randy Holt]

The San Diego Padres excelled just about everywhere on the Petco Park field on Tuesday night. Their 8-0 win over the Chicago Cubs in Game 1 of the National League's Wild Card Round was plenty of what we've become accustomed to in their scorching second half of the season. 

That, of course, means that the offense came to play. The Padres have featured one of the league's best groups in terms of run production since the end of July, and they wasted no time in putting the screws to Cubs starter Matthew Boyd in Game 1. Fernando Tatis Jr. led the charge: 

Having spent almost every calendar day since June reestablishing himself as a superstar on the Major League Baseball landscape, Tatis sent the first pitch that anyone in the Padre lineup saw on Tuesday over the fence for the 1-0 lead. Manny Machado would go on to add another before the inning was over, but Tatis wasn't done contributing highlights to the effort. 

After getting an excellent jump to catch an Ian Happ lineout that carried a .430 expected batting average, he put the game to bed for good in the seventh: 

Tatis ensured we saw all aspects of his dynamic game in Game 1. The power, the speed, and the glove were each on display. What's especially important, though, is the fact that he wasn't remotely by himself in showing out in the commanding victory. 

Machado's first-inning home run was followed by a third-inning double that scored Tatis and served as the game's hardest hit ball (108.0 MPH). Xander Bogaerts homered in the fourth inning and added a single on the second-hardest hit ball of the evening (107.3 MPH) in the eighth. Jackson Merrill added a two-RBI single in the fifth that pushed the lead the 6-0 (which, at 107.1 MPH, was the game's third-hardest hit ball). Every single member of the "core" group contributed at least two hits to the effort, with Ty France adding a pair of his own knocks. 

While it may be unrealistic to expect this kind of outburst every game for however long the Padres play in the postseason, the team's fortunes in the 2026 are going to be driven by exactly this type of effort. They've gotten plenty of supplementary contributions in the second half from the likes of Dustin Harris or Luis Campusano. But it's the core that is going to drive the team's improved offense as far as this whole thing is going to go. 

Central to all of it, though, is Fernando Tatis Jr. Despite carrying the longest power outage of his career almost into June, he finished the season in the top 10 in fWAR (5.4) among the league's position players. He's done it on the power side (25 home runs), on the bases (38 steals), and in the field (3 Outs Above Average). These playoffs are a forum for him to reestablish his name among the game's very best for a mainstream audience.

Seeing him lead the charge was an excellent sign for the immediate future, but it's going to take consistent contributions from a core group that has otherwise been streaky throughout the regular season. Tuesday showed what the offense looks like when they're all going at the same time.

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