Wrigley Field- Chicago, IL

Baseball is a weird sport. Teams spend 162 games trying to position themselves for the playoffs, and then it can all be undone by two swings.

That’s all it took for the Cubs to flip the script on the Padres in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series in Chicago.

Nick Pivetta got the honor as San Diego’s Game 1 starter. Manager Mike Shildt expressed supreme confidence in his big right-hander. It certainly started with Shildt looking like a genius. Pivetta tossed four shutout innings without the Cubs threatening much on the bases before the fifth.

Meanwhile, the Padres scratched across a run in the top of the second. Jackson Merrill hustled to a double on a flair down the right field line. Xander Bogaerts lined a ball into the left-center gap to score Merrill. Bogaerts then reached third on a throwing error from Pete Crow-Armstrong. That gave San Diego a runner on third with nobody out and a chance to add on.

Instead, Cubs’ starter Matthew Boyd shut things down with yielding some weak contact, preventing the Padres from scoring again. That missed chance would loom large.

After four brilliant innings, Pivetta faced the heart of the Cubs order a second time in the bottom of the fifth. On a day when the wind appeared to knock down several well-hit balls in the outfield, two Cubs hitters were able to send balls cutting through the wind into the seats at Wrigley.

Seiya Suzuki and Carson Kelly hit back-to-back home runs to give Chicago a 2-1 lead and send the fans at Wrigley Field into a frenzy. The momentum completely shifted on two swings.

The Padres were not devoid of more chances to score.

In the fourth, the Padres got runners on first and third and one out. As Boyd did in the second, he danced around danger. Ryan O’Hearn weakly popped out to shortstop, and Gavin Sheets flew out to end the inning.

From there, the Padres didn’t put up much of a fight, even when Boyd left in the middle of the fifth inning. Daniel Palencia came in throwing over 100 mph, and the Padres hitters looked overmatched.

The Cubs even got an insurance run in the bottom of the eighth on a sac fly against Jeremiah Estrada, who was not sharp.

The Padres went down with nary a whimper in the late innings, falling 3-1. The Cubs now own a commanding 1-0 series lead. No team in the current MLB postseason format has ever come back from down 1-0 in the Wild Card Series. History is now against the Padres as they try to even the series on Wednesday afternoon.

Nick Lee

Native of Escondido, CA. Lived in San Diego area for 20 years. Padres fan since childhood (mid-90s). I have been writing since 2014. I currently live near Seattle, WA and am married to a Seattle sports girl. I wore #19 on my high school baseball team for Tony Gwynn. I am a stats and sports history nerd. I attended BYU on the Idaho campus. I also love Star Wars.