Jackson Merrill practically glows at the ballpark.<\/p>\n
He is the youngest Padres player and the most obviously excited to be playing baseball every day.<\/p>\n
He knows the energy he brings is a component of his value. He and the veterans who have encouraged him to embrace a leadership role have said so.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday morning in the Padres clubhouse, with his team about to play a day game after losing the night before for the fourth time in five games this season, Merrill was bouncing off the walls. He joked, he teased, he talked to everyone who passed by.<\/p>\n
And he stayed hyped when the game began, getting the Padres on their way to a 7-1 victory over the San Francisco Giants by scoring from first base on a ground ball and an error in the first inning.<\/p>\n
\u201cJackson made a great play, great read getting to home,\u201d manager Craig Stammen said. \u201cHe can provide that energy. He slides in, jumps around, got that youthful energy. That\u2019s contagious and kind of helps us get going.\u201d<\/p>\n
Merrill\u2019s scamper around the bases provided the first of two runs the Padres scored because of errors before a previously moribund offense added on with a run in the sixth and four more in eighth.<\/p>\n
Just as encouraging for the Padres, who finished 2-4 on their season-opening homestand, was that a far more recognizable Nick Pivetta worked five scoreless innings.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat first game, that was not Pivetta,\u201d catcher Freddy Fermin said of Pivetta giving up six runs in three innings six days earlier against the Tigers on opening day. \u201cToday, he made adjustments. \u2026 He pitched in the right spots.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pivetta allowed just one hit and walked two on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s him,\u201d Manny Machado said. \u201cThat\u2019s who he is \u2014 the energy, pounding the zone, threw strikes, didn\u2019t get behind much.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pivetta struck out too many batters (eight) and had too many pitches fouled off to be efficient.\u00a0But unlike what had happened in his first start and the previous two nights with Walker Buehler and Germ\u00e1n M\u00e1rquez on the mound, when the Padres were down early, Pivetta got the game to a rested back end of the bullpen.<\/p>\n
That went pretty much according to plan. Jeremiah Estrada retired the Giants in order in the sixth inning. Adri\u00e1n Morej\u00f3n allowed a run in the seventh before getting the first two outs in the eighth. Mason Miller got the final four outs for his second save.<\/p>\n
Gavin Sheets doubled twice, scoring after the first and driving in a run with the second. Ram\u00f3n Laureano\u2019s two-run homer and Fernando Tatis Jr.\u2019s infield single with the bases loaded in the eighth inning were the last of the Padres\u2019 season-high 10 hits.<\/p>\n
The Padres would have been scoreless until the sixth inning if not for a pair of bad connections between the Giants corner infielders and Merrill\u2019s hustle.<\/p>\n
Merrill\u2019s two-out single helped the Padres to their first first-inning run of 2026.<\/p>\n
Machado followed by chopping a ground ball to the left side that third baseman Matt Chapman ran in to grab while Machado sprinted toward first.<\/p>\n
Chapman\u2019s throw was up the line and clipped first baseman Casey Schmitt\u2019s glove. The ball hit Machado as he passed by before it bounced just beyond the dirt into shallow right field. Merrill slowed at second but rounded it hard and was headed to third even before Chapman let go of the ball. Merrill slowed at third to see where the ball was and then took off for home, sliding in well before a wide throw from Jung Hoo Lee.<\/p>\n
On the play, Machado was given an infield single and Schmitt an error.<\/p>\n
It seemed Schmitt was again responsible for the Padres\u2019 second run, though an error would be assigned to Chapman.<\/p>\n
That happened in the fifth inning after Sheets led off with a double. Sheets moved to third on Fermin\u2019s grounder to the right side before Bryce Johnson struck out.<\/p>\n
The Padres had already squandered a leadoff double (by Johnson) in the third inning, and it appeared they would do so again when Xander Bogaerts sent a slow roller to the left side. But Sheets ended up scoring when Chapman fielded near shortstop and fired not all that high but off Schmitt\u2019s glove.<\/p>\n
The first RBI of the game came in the sixth, when Laureano and Jake Cronenworth reached on infield singles and Sheets lined a double to the gap in right-center.<\/p>\n
The Padres sent nine batters to the plate in the eighth inning, which began with Machado\u2019s double and featured four walks by Giants right-hander Jos\u00e9 Butt\u00f3.<\/p>\n
Merrill\u2019s dribbler in front of the plate resulted in an inning-ending double play in the eighth.<\/p>\n
But he was the one who started it all.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s just me playing aggressively,\u201d Merrill said. \u201cHave that energy, come to the clubhouse at nine in the morning and wake everybody up. That\u2019s what I love to do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jackson Merrill practically glows at the ballpark. He is the youngest Padres player and the most obviously excited…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":658262,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2408],"tags":[5,162,853,4,18,378,66,4343,4340,4344,4341,4342,185,3546],"class_list":{"0":"post-658261","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco-giants","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-giants","10":"tag-latest-headlines","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-san-diego-padres","13":"tag-san-francisco","14":"tag-san-francisco-giants","15":"tag-sanfrancisco","16":"tag-sanfranciscogiants","17":"tag-sf","18":"tag-sf-giants","19":"tag-sfgiants","20":"tag-sports","21":"tag-top-stories-sdut"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116333827555102522","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=658261"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658261\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=658261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=658261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=658261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}