Quote from WindsorUK on October 10, 2025, 6:36 am

Watching the Duds advance every year to the NL Championship round is an absolute downer( even worse if they win!)

But after watching last nights highlights, last years WS, and last year divisional round( against us), I have finally figured out why they have so much success( other than their trillion dollar payroll and being the worlds entertainment capital)- they wait for YOU to f**k up!

Last nights ending is something you might see in Little League. Last years clown show provided by the Yankees? Same thing. And watching us self implode over the last 25 innings, well, thats just the make-up of our team( did it again this year!)

Their top 2 veterans- Freeman and Betts- are not only elite level players but they keep such a high standard in not only the way they carry themselves on the field but off of it as well. And they absolutely put in the work! They set such a great tone for EVERY guy that sets foot in that clubhouse. If guys can't step up to that level, their not Duds long!

It's that kind of leadership that we so desperately lack. Whilst I'm a big Manny fan( productive both on O and D, and does not take ANY days off), he in no way embodies that kind of leadership. And as long as he's top dog in that clubhouse, we're going to have a hard time bringing in guys that can set that standard( being hamstrung with so many huge contracts is a barrier to us doing this as well!)

Preller 100% has his work cut out for him this off season, not only to bring in viable players but players that can - hopefully- override Machado's leadership role.

Quote from MrPadre19 on October 10, 2025, 6:48 am

The extra $100 mil in payroll helps them make up for when their best players don't produce.

Ohtani,Freeman,Smith,Kershaw did nothing in the playoffs....having 3-4 "extra" $30 mil per year players makes all the difference in the world.

We couldn't survive Tatis & Machado not hitting against the Cubs

 

Quote from BoosterSD on October 13, 2025, 1:34 pm

Condolences to the Alomar family as Sandy Alomar Sr has passed. A great baseball family, I believed that he coached here and of course both of his sons were in the MiLs of the Padres as well.

 

Quote from MrPadre19 on October 13, 2025, 1:37 pm

Quote from BoosterSD on October 13, 2025, 1:34 pm

Condolences to the Alomar family as Sandy Alomar Sr has passed. A great baseball family, I believed that he coached here and of course both of his sons were in the MiLs of the Padres as well.

 

I have a Bowman Baseball Card of all three of the Alomars' signed by them.

Got it signed by all 3 at a game in Atlanta in 1991 I believe.

Only valuable to me!

 

 

Quote from WindsorUK on October 13, 2025, 9:18 pm

Snellzilla in absolute killer mode!

First pitcher since San Diegan Don Larsen to face minimum number of batters through 8 innings.

Do we really expect anyone else to actually have a shot at dethroning them???

 

Quote from WindsorUK on October 21, 2025, 3:19 am

Anybody got Toronto in this series?

Of course I ask tongue in cheek, as there is NO WAY anybody is stopping the Shohei Express.

Realistically, we could be witnessing the beginnings of the greatest title run in the history of the sport. With the unlimited revenue streams of the worlds entertainment capital, the greatest player ever in his prime, the draw that is LA, the Duds are poised to win 3,4,5 championships in a row.

Our team needs to do something drastic if we want to stay even close.

Quote from MrPadre19 on October 21, 2025, 3:47 am

I sometimes wish Ohtani was on any other team so I could enjoy his feats more.

Hated that for Seattle last night.

As Padre fans we feel their pain but at least we’ve been to two World Series.

Has to be rough this morning for Mariners fan.

 

Quote from LynchMob on October 22, 2025, 7:30 am

Louisa Thomas in The New Yorker:

In the first game of the Wild Card Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Cincinnati Reds, the Dodgers’ superstar Shohei Ohtani hit two home runs. Then, in game after game, he swung at curves in the dirt and fastballs above the belt. He flung his bat at pitches wide off the plate and hit feeble ground balls off sinkers that ran in on his hands. He waited, in his majestic stance, and watched as third strikes sped by. In the National League Division Series, against the Philadelphia Phillies, Ohtani had one hit and nine strikeouts. His batting line: one for eighteen. In the first two games of the National League Championship Series, against the Milwaukee Brewers, he went one for seven with three strikeouts. In the third game of the N.L.C.S., he led off with a stand-up triple, though even that was more a testament to his strength and speed than to a recovery of his usual form. When he swung, he looked more like a golfer chipping a ball out of a sand trap than the reincarnation of Babe Ruth. Then he struck out three times.

Ordinarily, it would be a reasonable strategy for an opposing team to try to shut down the other team’s best player—particularly if that person is about to win his third straight Most Valuable Player award and can plausibly be considered the best player who has ever lived. The Phillies leaned especially hard into that approach, starting a series of lefty pitchers who were zeroed in on limiting the damage Ohtani caused. And it worked, in a sense. It was “the most impressive execution against a hitter I’ve ever seen,” the Dodgers’ president of baseball operations, Andrew Friedman, told the Athletic. The only problem with the plan was that the Dodgers were able to follow Ohtani with several future Hall of Famers who, batting right-handed, enjoyed the favorable matchup. The Dodgers beat the Phillies in four games, after making quick work of the Reds. And the Brewers’ reward for their mastery over Ohtani at the plate through the first three games? Three straight losses. Then, in Game Four, they had to face Ohtani on the mound.

 

This is the advantage that the Los Angeles Dodgers have had over the rest of major-league baseball, thrown into high relief: for much of the post-season, the team’s best player, the reigning M.V.P., couldn’t hit a beach ball, and it hardly seemed to matter. Knock out Ohtani? Here comes Mookie Betts, who finished the season on an offensive tear—after transforming himself, in his thirties, from one of the best defensive outfielders in the game into one of the best shortstops. After Betts comes Freddie Freeman, last year’s World Series M.V.P. And so on. What’s more, there’s been little pressure on any of them to perform at the plate, because the Dodgers’ starting pitchers are on a historic run. On Thursday, Los Angeles became the first team ever to allow fewer than two runs and five hits in four consecutive post-season games. Then, on Friday night, they tied the record for most consecutive games allowing one run or fewer, with five, to finish the series in a sweep.

That last game will be remembered for a long time. Ohtani walked the first batter he faced before striking out the next three. Then he came to the plate and launched a ball more than four hundred feet—the first time in M.L.B. history that one of the game’s pitchers had hit a lead-off home run. And that was just the beginning! Over the course of six innings, Ohtani—in his cool, inimitable fashion, with a motion that combines grace and force—gave up only two hits and struck out ten, including six out of the seven batters he’d faced during one stretch. In between, he hit a second homer, one that left the stadium, clearing the center-field roof. As it hung in the night sky, his teammates in the dugout and in the bullpen, who have had a closeup view for all of Ohtani’s Bunyanesque feats, clutched their heads in disbelief. And then he hit a third! It was the greatest performance by the greatest player in history.

Ohtani’s value to the Los Angeles Dodgers is immeasurable. His contract—seven hundred million dollars for ten years, with team-friendly deferrals—is, considering what he brings to the team both on and off the field, a steal. Still, not every M.L.B. team could, or would, pay anyone so much, let alone surround him with other players on gargantuan contracts.

The Dodgers have a payroll of more than three hundred and fifty million dollars, which is nearly three times the size of the Brewers’. This has caused the usual hand-wringing about competitive imbalance and the inherent plight of small-market teams. It’s easy enough to see the crude outlines of a narrative. In game one of the N.L.C.S., Blake Snell, a former Cy Young winner who’d signed with the Dodgers in the off-season for nearly two hundred million dollars, threw eight shutout innings. Then in Game Two came Yoshinobu Yamamoto (three hundred and twenty-five million for twelve years), who gave up a home run to the first batter before pitching a complete game in which no one else got to second base. Tyler Glasnow, who signed with the club for more than a hundred and thirty million dollars over five years, gave up one run in Game Three. Then came Ohtani. The Dodgers have had fifteen consecutive winning seasons and thirteen consecutive playoff appearances, and have already won two World Series this decade. They need another championship like Taylor Swift needs a Grammy. But they’ve become a symbol of something bigger than a juggernaut. They’re sometimes framed as an existential threat to the other teams.

It’s a strange argument—the Brewers, not the Dodgers, had the best record in baseball during the regular season. The Dodgers, in fact, were mediocre for a long stretch in the middle of the season, and lost all six regular-season games they played against the Brewers this year. If anything, the two franchises seemed to support the notion that payroll is only loosely correlated with success. (And let’s not talk right now about the New York Mets.) What’s more, much of the Dodgers’ talent was undervalued by other teams. Betts was traded to the Dodgers by the Boston Red Sox. Max Muncy, who recently set the record for most post-season homers, was claimed off waivers after being released by the Oakland Athletics. For a while last off-season, Snell’s agent had trouble finding a buyer. Rōki Sasaki, who had been an impressive starting pitcher in Japan, was sought after by practically every M.L.B. team—each of which would have been allowed to pay him more or less the same small amount, owing to M.L.B.’s international-amateur-free-agent rules. But his choice to come to the Dodgers was validated when, after joining the team, he struggled badly with his velocity as a starter. He went to the Dodgers’ complex in Arizona, worked with the team’s performance staff, tweaked his mechanics, and embraced a new role in the bullpen, becoming a fearsome reliever almost overnight. It’s a story about competence and trust as much as luxury taxes and revenue.

That’s what really sets the Dodgers apart: they’re good at being good, not just occasionally great. For the past week, Pat Murphy, the Brewers’ manager, has been going on a media spree, trying to make the case that his team is the greatest underdog the sport has ever seen. He’s called attention to salary disparities. He has joked that the series would only be fair if Dodgers’ players wore their gloves on their opposite hands. Murphy made an argument to a writer for the Athletic that his team had no stars, while the Dodgers were full of celebrities. Then, for evidence, he pointed to Mookie Betts, who, at just that moment, zoomed by in a golf cart driven by a Brewers clubhouse attendant. Betts had a big smile on his face. He was being treated better than Murphy, in Murphy’s own stadium!

Or perhaps there was a simpler explanation. Of course Betts had been offered a ride: his smile is infectious. Who can root against him? Likewise, it was impossible to watch Ohtani on Friday and do anything but appreciate the grace of his movements and the grandeur of his performance. Even a hater has to tip her cap.

Quote from MrPadre19 on October 22, 2025, 9:33 am

"the Brewers, not the Dodgers, had the best record in baseball during the regular season. The Dodgers, in fact, were mediocre for a long stretch in the middle of the season, and lost all six regular-season games they played against the Brewers this year."

 

But the Brewers were mostly all healthy while the dodgers were "mediocre" with just about their entire rotation out injured.

If the Brewers had lost 3-4 of their starters all during the same time....no way they have the best record.

This again is what an "extra" $100 mil does for you