Padres sliding in NL playoff picture as struggles to build momentum continue

SAN DIEGO -- Manny Machado homered, but the Padres’ bats otherwise went cold in a 3-1 loss to the Diamondbacks on Thursday night.

Here’s some instant reaction from Petco Park, where San Diego settled for a split of its four-game series this week.

One step forward, one step back

Have you checked the standings lately?

If the Padres were in the American League, their current plight would probably be fine. They could teeter around .500 and still find themselves squarely in the mix. That’s how the Wild Card race is shaping up over there.

But in the National League? There’s some separation. And the Padres are on the wrong side of that separation.

Thursday’s loss dropped them back below .500 -- and 5 1/2 games back of the Phillies and Marlins, who currently occupy the final Wild Card spots. That’s a significant gap -- not to mention the three other teams the Padres need to hurdle.

“I’m going to believe, and I’m going to push these guys,” manager Craig Stammen said. “And these guys are going to push each other. … You can’t make a winning streak happen. All you can do is put in the work every day.”

The Padres’ Trade Deadline strategy will almost certainly be tied to their position in the playoff picture. Ideally, they’d be squarely in the mix and looking to buy a starter or two, plus another bat.

But for those kinds of moves to be worth the cost, the Padres need to establish themselves as part of that playoff mix. Thursday was another missed opportunity on that front. They scored 10 runs on Wednesday, but mustered just one on Thursday, as the last 14 hitters went down in order.

“A game like tonight, we didn’t hit the ball very well,” Stammen said. “That’s not going to help us go on a sustained run. We’ve got to have consistent days and weeks of hitting the ball the way we’re capable of.”

A batter too late … twice?

With the game tied at 1 in the fifth inning, the D-backs turned their lineup over against Padres starter Griffin Canning. Left-hander Yuki Matsui was loose with a pair of switch-hitters due up and the go-ahead run on second base.

Stammen stuck with Canning for a third time against Ketel Marte, a slight deviation from how Canning has been used lately. The move was sensible enough. Marte has mashed against lefties. He ended up flying to right, which brought Geraldo Perdomo to the plate.

Perdomo’s splits are more even. But Stammen stuck with Canning, and Perdomo shot a go-ahead single through the middle. The D-backs grabbed the lead.

An inning later, Matsui remained in the game and retired the left-handed-hitting Max Kepler (a favorable matchup for the Padres). But with righties Lourdes Gurriel Jr. and Nolan Arenado due, Stammen stuck with Matsui. Arenado took him deep, giving the D-backs a 3-1 lead. After the ensuing walk, Matsui was lifted in favor of Bradgley Rodriguez.

Those decisions raise, essentially, the same question. If you’re willing to go to Matsui in the fifth, why not go to him for Perdomo? And if you’re willing to go to Rodriguez in the sixth, why not go to him for Gurriel and Arenado?

The answer goes back to a taxed San Diego bullpen and Stammen looking for extra outs wherever he can find them. It burned him on Thursday night.

More power from Machado

Been a strange season for Machado. How strange? He’s currently on pace for the lowest batting average by any 30-homer hitter in MLB history.

Machado mashed his 19th home run of the season on Thursday night, putting the Padres on top 1-0 in the second inning. He went the other way against Merrill Kelly, who was otherwise brilliant, holding the Padres to just that one run across seven innings.

Machado appears to be healthy after he fouled a ball off of his toe on Tuesday night, then was out of the lineup Wednesday. He also laced a single to left in the fourth off Kelly and is up to .193 in the batting-average department.

“Obviously I put myself in a hole early in the year,” Machado said. “Just trying to crawl up that roller coaster.”

To date, Kyle Schwarber’s .197 average in 2023 is the lowest for a player who hit at least 30 homers. (He hit 47.) That’s a mark Machado would like to avoid; at least on the batting-average front. He’d certainly take 30 homers -- and appears to be trending in that direction for the eighth time in his career.