Good morning,
Where to start?
The Padres played their worst game of the season and lost for the fourth time in five games.
“Yeah,” manager Craig Stammen said, “we’re not playing our best right now.”
That quote was in my game story (here) from last night’s 9-3 loss to the Giants.
Stammen went on to acknowledge how much of the season is left and assert how much he is looking forward to it.
We don’t read nearly as much into or end up remembering how a team does in Games 31 to 35 or 84 to 88 or any other five-game stretch in a season.
But this is what we have, and the Padres have been a sorta sorry bunch so far.
This is the Padres’ worst start since they also began 1-4 in 2018.
It is the 13th time they have been 1-4 or worse in the franchise’s 58 years of existence — most of which have not been all that good — the Padres have lost at least four of their first five games.
It is just the 10th time they have scored 12 runs or fewer in the first five games of a season.
Now, in the past five years, 49 MLB teams have begun a season 1-4 or 0-5. Nine of them have made the postseason. The 2021 Braves won that year’s World Series.
With that bit of perspective in mind, it is still OK to lament that the Padres have so far been largely odious.
The Padres offense has yet to produce more than three runs in a game and is batting .182 with a .515 OPS (both worst in MLB).
Their pitching staff has allowed five or more runs in three games, two of which saw their starting pitcher all three or more runs in the first inning.
And last night was ugly to boot.
Not helping
The Padres were not charged with an error last night until the game was out of hand. But they did not play cleanly.
Yes, Germán Márquez surrendered three runs in the first inning. But one of them was squarely the fault of left fielder Nick Castellanos, who fielded Matt Chapman’s single and threw to third base with no chance to get the lead runner there, allowing Chapman to advance to second. Both runners scored on Jung Hoo Lee’s double before the next batter grounded out to end the inning. Had he been on first base, Chapman would not have been waived home to test Fernando Tatis Jr.’s arm.
The inning that decided the game featured two plays by the Padres that could have prevented runs.
With the Giants up 4-3, Harrison Bader led off the sixth inning with a long fly ball to the gap in right field that Jackson Merrill made an exceptional effort to chase down, sprinting 111 feet before stopping and seeing the ball drop between him, the wall and Tatis.
“I just should have had it,” Merrill said. “… Going really hard and the wall was kind of getting on us. I think I could have caught it. It was just like a little hesitation, that little hesitation.”
Kyle Hart, who had worked two scoreless innings then walked No.8 hitter Patrick Bailey before striking out Casey Schmitt.
Willy Adames followed with an RBI single grounded up the middle before Rafael Devers hit a slow-rolling grounder to first base.
Hart slowed for an instant before charging off the mound, and Devers, who is no one’s idea of fast, beat out the underhand shovel from Gavin Sheets.
“I thought Devers hit the ball off his foot, and I was late to first,” Hart said. “That’s a 99-out-of-100 out in my opinion. I thought the ball was off his foot. I’m not saying that there was a missed call or anything. That’s just what I saw. And that was where the hesitation cost me the out.”
With the bases loaded, Bradgley Rodriguez came into face Heliot Ramos, who grounded a two-run single through the left side.
They’re calling Rafael Devers the fastest man to ever live pic.twitter.com/c4rtBV65RJ
— SF Giants on NBCS (@NBCSGiants) April 1, 2026
Not this one
Funny enough, one time the Padres would have been charged with an error last night, they got an inning-ending out.
That came in the fifth inning when Lee hit his second double of the night and Tatis’ throw into the infield bounced in front of and got past second baseman Jake Cronenworth.
That prompted Lee to take off for third. Xander Bogaerts picked up the the ball and threw to Manny Machado at third base. Lee was called out.
A replay review showed he evaded the tag and touched the base safely, but Machado has smartly kept his glove applied to Lee’s thigh. Thus, because Lee’s hand momentarily came off the bag, the out call stood.
After a Giants challenge and lengthy review, the out call on Jung Hoo Lee following this play was upheld pic.twitter.com/zQD4SqblXq
— SF Giants on NBCS (@NBCSGiants) April 1, 2026
Too long?
You pretty much knew Stammen was going to give his pitchers the benefit of the doubt, perhaps to the point where his judgment was doubted.
That has happened.
He used to be one of them. It is a potential soft spot he seems to be aware of and will likely adjust, at least to some extent.
For the second time in five games, his decision to leave a pitcher in a game could be rightly questioned.
Last night, it was the left-handed Hart, who took over for Márquez at the start of the fourth inning and ran his season-opening streak to 11 straight batters retired and then got out of the fifth with that wacky out.
He had thrown 28 pitches when the sixth inning began. That wasn’t the problem.
“I was really excited to go back out for the third (inning),” he said. “Even though that’s a righty-heavy spot right there, I felt really good about going out there in that sixth inning and just controlling the game. That’s what I was going out there to do. And that was what was on my mind. And it just didn’t work out. … I felt great. I just didn’t make pitches. But I felt awesome.”
The questionable move was Stammen leaving in Hart to face Adames, who bats from the right side, at the top of the order.
“I felt like I wanted him to face Devers,” Stammen said, referring to the fact the left-handed-hitting Devers was batting after Adames. “And, you know, Kyle had been really pitching really well until that point. Just felt like he was the guy at that moment. But hindsight is 20/20, and I could have went to somebody else there. And you never know what would have happened. But I trusted Kyle in that situation. He’s been throwing the ball really well. Really cruised through the first two (innings), so I felt comfortable with him in the third.”
Stammen speaks truth. There is no way to know.
It is ridiculous to assume as fact that a manager making a different move would have resulted in a better outcome.
But it is the manager’s job to maneuver in a way that puts the best pieces in the best spots.
It will be interesting to watch Stammen evolve in his new role.
Two down
Márquez’s primary problem was easy to diagnose. He couldn’t command his best pitch — his curveball.
It wasn’t the ones he missed the strike zone with. It was that he didn’t miss many bats with the pitch. It yielded Adames’ home run to start the game, as well as a double and a single.
So now we have seen Walker Buehler allow three runs in four innings and Márquez four runs in three innings in their first turn with the Padres.
The two veteran reclamation projects will get more, though not infinite chances, before other solutions are tried.
“You try not to judge people on one outing, especially a three-inning outing or a four-inning outing,” Stammen said. “These guys are big-league pitchers, and we’ll try to hopefully give them a little bit of a chance to prove themselves before we come to any rash decisions on that stuff.”
A shakeup
Castellanos was in left field and Miguel Andujar served as designated hitter while Ramón Laureano sat yesterday, despite being the only Padres player to have reached base in each of the first four games.
The Padres are trying to get Castellanos and Andujar playing time.
“Try to find the groove for some of those guys, get them hot,” Stammen said before the game. “You know, it’s tough for guys to play here, there and everywhere, but trying to get them a little bit more consistent (at-bats) and get a couple more guys hot in the lineup.”
It did not hurt that entering the game Castellanos was 4-for-7 against Giants starter Logan Webb and Andujar was 3-for-7. Laureano was 0-for-7.
Andujar was 1-for-3 against Webb last night and 1-for-4 in the game. Castellanos drew a walk in two at-bats against Webb and later doubled.
Tidbits
Check out Jeff Sanders’ notebook (here) with Stammen talking about the erroneous strike call that Tatis did not challenge during a ninth-inning strikeout in Monday’s 3-2 loss.
David Morgan is one of five MLB pitchers to have appeared in four games. He never pitched four times in six days in 2025, his rookie season. After working four scoreless innings in his previous three appearances, he allowed an unearned run last night. That run scored with help from Freddy Fermin throwing a ball into center field trying to get a base stealer.
None of the six batters walked by Padres pitchers the previous two games had scored. Both did last night. Of the 25 runs the Padres have allowed, nine have been scored by players who reached base on walks.
Merrill drove in his team-leading fourth run last night. He is 3-for-9 with runners in scoring position. Tatis is 1-for-2. The rest of the team is 3-for-24.
Tatis was 1-for-3 with a double and a walk last night. He is 4-for-17 with three walks. Three of his hits, including the double, have been to the opposite field.
Manny Machado was 1-for-3 with a walk. He is 3-for-15 with five walks.
Gavin Sheets’ single in the ninth inning was his first hit of the season after 13 outs. Sheets is chasing pitches outside the zone at a 43% rate.
The Padres have missed a lot of pitches they should have done damage on, especially against Webb. But it is somewhat remarkable they have struck out just 44 times in five games. Of the five starting pitchers they have faced, Tarik Skubal ranked second in the major leagues in strikeouts last season, Webb third, Jack Flaherty 19th and Framber Valdez 20th.
Bad editing
Welp! This is how I signed off in yesterday’s newsletter:
Screenshot
I use the same file to write every newsletter, and I often just delete everything from the previous newsletter except the salutations at the top and bottom. I evidently did not edit the final two sentences yesterday.
Sorry.
There was a game last night, in case you were wondering. I hope none of you missed it because of me. Or maybe I did you a favor.
All right, that’s it for me.
Day game today (1:10 p.m. PT). I promise. Talk to you tomorrow.