Good morning from Los Angeles,

Xander Bogaerts came through.

After having gone 1-for-12 in this series and failing in all but one of his previous 19 trips to the plate with runners in scoring position, Bogaerts drove in the game-tying run with a double in the top of the ninth inning last night.

Then he watched from his spot at shortstop while Will Smith’s walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth sailed just over the right field wall to give the Dodgers a 4-3 victory.

“One of the few positive things I do, it don’t even last a couple minutes,” Bogaerts said. “… It’s brutal. Rough.”

Such are the times for the Padres right now.

They have lost five of the six games on this road trip and will have to win tonight to avoid being swept in a four-game series for the first time since 2017 in Atlanta.

The Padres have come back as they did last night often enough that they know they are capable. That is important.

The bullpen has blown enough leads in the past five weeks that it now looms over every late-game appearance. That is important.

But last night was also a manifestation of what was talked about in yesterday’s newsletter — that the Padres are losing because they are failing, especially offensively, in the middle of games.

My game story (here) focused on the fact the Padres led early again only to not do anything for six innings.

The Padres have now held a lead in 17 consecutive games and lost a startling 10 of those.

That is not all on the bullpen.

“A lot of games are won in the fifth and sixth,” Padres manager Mike Shildt said. “… It’s really two things. We’ve either gotten a lead, but we haven’t been able to add on. … That’s part of it. And then, you know, when you’re playing close games and you give up a run or two in the middle, it comes back to hurt you.”

Yes, here we are talking again about the Padres playing close games — too many of them because the offense has been wholly inconsistent — and putting nearly constant pressure on the pitching staff.

And that brings me to the other focus in the game story — the importance of Stephen Kolek pitching into the seventh inning and the overall state of the starting rotation. Included in that story is an update on Michael King, who may return in a month or two or three or not at all this season.

Also in the game story is Shildt explaining why he was OK with third base coach Tim Leiper stopping Brandon Lockridge at third base on Bogaerts’ hit.

It certainly looked like it would have been too close at the plate to risk.

Now, the argument could be made that Lockridge did not get a good jump on the ball.

And as Fernando Tatis Jr. said after the game, “Every detail matters (in) this game. It’s a game of inches. We’ve got to take care of the ball, play good defense, run the bases right. You know, small details.”

That is not to say Lockridge beginning his full sprint a second earlier would have enabled him to get to third soon enough for Leiper to have made a different call.

Fact is, though, the Padres are not making the breaks they were early in the season.

Tatis had Max Muncy’s triple that started the Dodgers’ three-run fifth inning go off his glove as he ran back toward the wall, though that play should be filed under could have rather than should have.

Said Tatis: “The ball had a lot of spin. … Trying to jump and make a play for my boy on the mound, but sadly I couldn’t.”

Tatis also came agonizingly close to catching Smith’s homer.

Will Smith gets Dodger Stadium jumping! #Walkoff pic.twitter.com/bmgRBIHH79

— MLB (@MLB) June 19, 2025

“I was playing too close to the line,” Tatis said. “So, yeah, I got there just half a second late.”

So, close.

You probably don’t need reminding what “close” gets a team at the end of the season. But here is a reminder: The 2023 Padres, who missed the postseason by two games, were an MLB-worst 25-42 in one-run games.

This year’s Padres have the seventh-best record in the major leagues in one-run games (23-17). But they have lost five of their past six one-run games.

“When you play close games and you don’t win a couple, it really hurts,” Shildt said. “And when you string a couple of those together, it doesn’t feel great. I will not alibi the fact that end results are what’s important here. Not close. But I also have enough experience and trust and belief in our group and know that this game can be unforgiving, to know that it’s really a couple balls here and there that go our way and we’re in here talking about how well we’re playing. Literally in the same baseball games.

“But the scoreboard at the end doesn’t lie, and we have to answer for it. But I have complete confidence that we’ll get those bigger hits and add on in the fifth or sixth. We’ll get those shutdown innings in the fifth or sixth. And we’ll start to reel off three, four, five, six, seven series in a row that we win. And we’ll be in a great spot.”

Presented a few minutes later with the reality that it is the middle of June and more than half the season remains, Tatis basically spat on the notion.

“Yeah, there’s a lot of season left,” he said. “But we have to win ballgames if we want to reach our goal. Yeah. We just just need to be better.”

Nothing doing

Andy Pages got hit by another pitch, and he wasn’t happy.

After Kolek’s 91 mph fastball sailed up toward his face and ultimately hit him in the shoulder, Pages stared at Kolek for an extended period while slowly removing his batting gloves.

Andy Pages gets hit and stares at Kolek pic.twitter.com/C3ClW6Tjpt

— Talking Friars (@TalkingFriars) June 19, 2025

No one else seemed to have an issue with the pitch. Kolek had just walked Muncy.

“It felt super slick out of my hand and it just absolutely slipped,” Kolek said. “I was trying to go up and in to him but definitely not at his head or anything. … Thankfully, he’s alright.”

Pages was the first batter to be hit in the series, and he yelled at Dylan Cease afterward. Then came Tuesday night’s drama before last night’s reprieve.

Not a fan

Some of the biggest moments of Tatis’ career have come at Dodger Stadium.

His dozen homers here are more than any ballpark besides Petco Park. That does not include the two he hit in Game 2 of last year’s National League Division Series.

That provides context for how bad it must be that Tatis said yesterday afternoon, “I just don’t like it.”

Tatis laughed before saying it, but he was not joking.

Among the indignities he has endured here is a significant number of fans cheering when he was hit in the back by a 95 mph fastball Tuesday night.

“Everybody knows Dodgers fans,” Tatis said. “It’s part of the circus.”

Tidbits

• The Padres are 39-34. The last time they were just five games above .500 was when they were 7-2 on April 5.
• Bogaerts’ double had an exit velocity of 112.2 mph, tied with a double in the season’s second game for the hardest ball he has put in play this season. Not that it has mattered for him. His .469 batting average on balls put in play at 100 mph or harder is 98 points below the league-wide average on such balls.
• Gavin Sheets was 1-for-4 last night and is batting .375 (12-for-32) during a career-high nine-game hitting streak.
• Luis Arraez was 2-for-4 last night and is 5-for-9 over the past two games, raising his batting average nine points to .283, still the lowest in his career 67 games into a season.
• Bryce Johnson, who was recalled from Triple-A Monday, started in center field last night. He was the third different starter there in the four games since Jackson Merrill went on the seven-day concussion injured list.
• Johnson’s double with two outs in the eighth inning ended a streak of 18 consecutive batters retired by Dodgers pitchers Emmet Sheehan and Justin Wrobleski.
• Jose Iglesias, who was hit by a pitch in the seventh inning Tuesday, pinch-hit for designated hitter Trenton Brooks and then remained in the game as the DH. Iglesias, who had the area above his left wrist wrapped, was 0-for-2.

All right, that’s it for me.

Talk to you tomorrow.