The 42,492 at Petco Park for the Padres’ push at 12 straight home wins to open the year were treated to a thriller. While there wasn’t as much explosiveness, there was more than enough drama. The Cubs took the Padres to extra innings, where the contest ended dramatically with an intentional walk and a lineout to end the game.

San Diego faced Shota Imanaga for the third time in the young lefty’s two-year career. The Japanese ace has the Padres’ number so far. He’s posted a 1.88 ERA, with the only runs coming on two very short home runs. Most importantly, he’s been efficient, averaging a steady 13 pitches per inning across the two starts amidst his success.

Meanwhile, Randy Vasquez made his fourth start of the year for the brown and gold. His stuff was sharp, especially the arm side breaking pitches, his cutter and sweeper. The cutter was up 1.3 MPH from his recent starts, and the sweeper also picked up an additional 2″ of break.

After the offensive fireworks show last season, the middle game began as a pitcher’s duel, though a rather grindy one. Imanaga got off to a quick start, retiring the first five batters he faced en route to a dominant first two innings. However, the Padres were able to draw a couple of walks around a Fernando Tatis Jr. single that loaded the bases for Manny Machado. However, four straight fastballs got Machado to strike out swinging. Three pitches later, Xander Bogaerts got jammed, popping it up to first and allowing Imanaga to escape the jam.

Vasquez worked out of a jam of his own before San Diego was knocking on the door again. Oscar Gonzalez got things started with a single before Jose Iglesias went to the opposite field for a double. However, Imanaga escaped the danger once again, with strikeouts of Jason Heyward and Martin Maldonado.

Shota Imanaga escapes another jam ? pic.twitter.com/QSH6psGiSs

— Marquee Sports Network (@WatchMarquee) April 16, 2025

It looked almost certain that Imanaga would breeze through his sixth inning of work, but Manny Machado had other plans. Machado worked a nine pitch at-bat– two of which were ruled errors on should’ve-been catches– before unloading the ninth pitch an even 400 feet to put San Diego up 1-0.

Manny Machado leans into this baseball and sends it a long way ? pic.twitter.com/dytKW8jtdM

— MLB (@MLB) April 16, 2025

However, the momentum didn’t last very long. Back-to-back singles from Dansby Swanson and Nico Hoerner forced Vasquez out of the game before he could record an out. Adrian Morejon came on to face Pete Crow-Armstrong with runners on the corners. A squeeze bunt got the Cubs on the board to tie the game. However, in the next at-bat, Luis Arraez fielded a grounder and gunned down the runner at home. A flyout from Michael Busch kept the score locked at one apiece.

Jeremiah Estrada came on in the seventh after Morejon allowed a ringer of a single to Kyle Tucker. Estrada got Justin Turner via the punchout and got a comebacker from Michael Busch that should’ve ended the inning. However, Estrada’s throw pulled Bogaerts off the bag, and with the ball rolling away, Tucker ended up on third base. Estrada was able to work around it, sitting Swanson down on four pitches and inducing a soft liner to, once again, escape a jam.

A scoreless eighth from the setup man Jason Adam gave way to the heart of the Padres lineup for the bottom half. Luis Arraez singled, but a quick strikeout from Machado and a double play from Bogaerts quickly shut down the frame.

Robert Suarez came in to hold off Chicago in the ninth, although he nearly got tagged by a go-ahead homer. After retiring the first two batters, Michael Busch sent a changeup off the top of the home run porch in right, missing the home run by a few feet. Fortunately, Dansby Swanson swung through 99 mph gas at the top of the zone to send the game to the bottom. Gavin Sheets led off with a good at-bat that ended rather abruptly with a perfect curveball for strike three. Consequently, groundouts to third from Yuli Gurriel and Jose Iglesias sent the game to extras.

Yuki Matsui allowed a leadoff, RBI triple to Nico Hoerner, which would be huge for the Cubs, who failed to score Hoerner from third with no outs. The 2-1 game flipped over to the Padres 8-9-1 hitters, which would become the 8-9-2 after an anti-climatic intentional walk to Fernando Tatis Jr. Connor Joe led off the inning– and his Padres tenure– striking out looking on a down-and-in fastball. Elías Díaz also came in to hit in the pinch, but more importantly, Jose Iglesias stole third base during the at-bat.

Nico Hoerner triples to give the @Cubs the lead in extras ? pic.twitter.com/geDO06ar91

— MLB (@MLB) April 16, 2025

Tatis Jr. came up with a chance to win the game, which was quickly interrupted by a high-maintenance mound visit. Connor Thielbar began the at-bat with two cautious curveballs that missed before issuing the intentional walk. Luis Arraez came up with his chance but swung at the first pitch he saw, lining it comfortably into Ian Happ’s left-field glove.

San Diego’s 11-game home winning streak came a heartbreaking end, but even including the effort on the mound tonight, the Friars’ run was some of the best baseball to come out of Petco Park in recent years, and not a player on the roster should hang their head on this impressive three weeks of baseball.

In a rubber match, San Diego will see Chicago for the season series finale. Matthew Boyd will be on the rubber for the Cubs, and Nick Pivetta for the Padres. The first pitch is slated for 12:45 p.m. on Wednesday.

Willy Warren

A 17-year-old San Diego native, Willy Warren is a baseball fan at heart who created High Leverage Baseball, a combination of around-the-league statistical analysis and breakdowns on X, and daily newsletters on the TikTok platform. Willy passionately studies Journalism at San Dieguito Academy, and is working to become billingual in Spanish to assist in communicating with Latin-born players and coaches.