DENVER -- Fresh off an ugly three-game sweep at the hands of the Rockies in Denver, the Padres on Wednesday boarded their team charter bound for San Diego. A packed house awaits them at Petco Park on Thursday, the first time the downtown ballpark will be open to full capacity since 2019.

When word of the ballpark's full reopening came down last month, the Padres were, quite frankly, a different team. They were in the midst of an invigorating nine-game winning streak, owners of one of the best records in the Majors. The prospect of a summer’s worth of full-capacity crowds at Petco Park felt like something of a procession to October baseball. This was a team that entered the year with legitimate World Series aspirations, and it was on course.

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On the heels of an 8-7 loss at Coors Field on Wednesday -- San Diego’s 13th defeat in its past 17 games -- October baseball no longer feels like such a foregone conclusion. Little has gone right for the Padres this month, and manager Jayce Tingler summed up his team’s 1-5 road trip thusly:

“Just terrible,” Tingler said. “There’s no sugarcoating it. We’re not playing well.”

Specifically, the Padres have struggled offensively. And when their offense finally broke out for seven runs on Wednesday afternoon, Blake Snell gave up just as many, his ERA ballooning to 5.72. Each San Diego starting position player reached base at least once on Wednesday, but the club still lost. Pinch-hitter Charlie Blackmon delivered a walk-off single against Austin Adams in the bottom of the ninth.

It’s only mid-June, but the National League West is slowly slipping from the Padres’ grasp. They sit seven games back of the Giants in the loss column, and six behind the Dodgers, their chance to gain ground against the slumping Rockies this week squandered.

“Definitely there’s a sense of urgency,” Tingler said. “… We’ve talked about our division being extremely tough. We’ve talked about the quality of the teams in the National League. You want to stay in the fight. You don’t want to dig too big a hole.”

The Padres’ recent struggles are, of course, layered. There are a handful of obvious reasons for the team’s current performance. There are a handful of less obvious reasons.

Let’s start with the obvious: Fernando Tatis Jr. is doing everything he can to carry the Padres these days. (He homered again on Wednesday, his NL-leading 21st of the season.) Tatis is getting very little help around him -- specifically from three big-name, big-money hitters mired in season-long slumps. Manny Machado (.749 OPS), Eric Hosmer (.669) and Wil Myers (.700) have all posted numbers well below their career averages.

As such, the Padres’ offense has fallen into a collective rut. The team’s .691 OPS ranks 21st in the Majors. This cast of characters is largely the same as the group that ranked fourth in that department last season.

“I think we’re putting a little bit of pressure on ourselves,” said utility man Jurickson Profar, whose own struggles have been particularly pronounced. “We know what we are capable of. … Things are not going good right now. But we are too good for things to keep going this way.”

In that sense, Wednesday’s offensive breakout was a step in the right direction. The return of Trent Grisham, who launched a two-run homer in the third inning and tied the game with a sac fly in the top of the ninth, is a huge boost for San Diego’s lineup. Machado had two hits, including a double.

Perhaps the breakout can be attributed to the conditions at hitter-friendly Coors Field. Perhaps the same could be said of Snell’s poor outing. Then again, rocky road outings like this one have come to define Snell’s Padres tenure.

“I’ve never struggled for this long,” Snell said. “Obviously right now it sucks. But I need to find the good in it. I need to find what’s going to make me me. It’s been really frustrating.”

Those are the macro concerns. A significant handful of the team’s most important pieces aren’t performing up to their usual standards. But lately, the Padres’ struggles run deeper than a few underperforming stars.

Under Tingler, the Padres have generally been a fundamentally sound team. They certainly were in 2020. Lately, they’ve made some uncharacteristic mistakes. Consider the three games this week.

On Monday, Victor Caratini’s hesitation on Ryan Weathers’ bunt attempt proved costly. On Tuesday, Tommy Pham was caught stealing in the eighth inning with Tatis due up as the tying run. On Wednesday, two Padres were nabbed on the basepaths, while the Rockies took extra bases at every turn.

“When you’re not clicking on all the cylinders, you’ve got to win those battles,” Tingler said.

Lately, the Padres haven’t been. Perhaps a return to a packed Petco Park will change their fortunes. The sooner the better, if they truly plan on making the prospect of October baseball in San Diego a reality.