San Diego Padres

The San Diego Padres announced that right-handed pitcher Dan Altavilla has replaced starting pitcher Mike Clevinger on their 28-man National League Division Series roster because of an injury.

Clevinger started Game 1 of the NLDS against the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday. After pitching one shutout inning, the right-hander left in the second inning with a trainer after experiencing elbow discomfort.

Padres manager Jayce Tingler and Clevinger both explained more after the game, per Dennis Lin of The Athletic:

Clevinger said the discomfort in his arm feels like "bones are hitting in the back of my elbow."

— Dennis Lin (@dennistlin) October 7, 2020

Per Lin, Clevinger must also miss the National League Championship Series should the Padres get that far. Major League Rule 40(a)(4)(C) states why:

"The injured player being replaced shall be ineligible to play for the remainder of such series, as well as the next subsequent post-season series that year. Notwithstanding the foregoing, a replaced player, who has suffered an acute concussion during a post-season series, may be eligible to play in the next subsequent post-season series that year, provided that the player has been ineligible to play for a minimum of seven days, and Major League Baseball's Medical Director has reviewed a Return to Play form and supporting information and approved the reinstatement."

San Diego acquired the 30-year-old Clevinger on Aug. 31 from the Cleveland Indians as part of a series of moves to gear up for a postseason run.

Clevinger has gone 3-2 with a 3.02 ERA in eight starts in 2020, striking out 40 batters in 41.2 innings.

The right-hander left a Sept. 23 start against the Los Angeles Angels after just one inning with an injury later diagnosed as a sprained elbow, per Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune.

San Diego held out hope that Clevinger could pitch sometime in the playoffs, and that came to fruition when he got the call to start against the Dodgers. However, the earliest that Clevinger can now return is the World Series.

The Padres beat the St. Louis Cardinals two games to one in their National League Wild Card Series to advanced to the NLDS.

The Dodgers took Game 1 by a 5-1 score on Tuesday. Game 2 will take place Wednesday at 9:08 p.m. ET. Zach Davies will get the ball for San Diego, while Los Angeles will start Clayton Kershaw.

San Diego Padres starter Mike Clevinger exited his postseason debut in the second inning of his start during Game 1 of the National League Division Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday.

Clevinger, who missed the team's Wild Card Series with an elbow injury, threw 24 pitches before the Padres pulled him with an injury, according to ESPN's Jeff Passan.

Passan noted that Clevinger started the inning off with a 91 mph fastball before his velocity dropped to 77 mph on a slider on the next pitch. The Padres pulled him immediately.

After the game, Padres manager Jayce Tingler told reporters Clevinger was being evaluated and was currently day-to-day.

Tingler told Fox Sports 1 that the length of the top of the second inning, when Dodgers pitcher Walker Buehler faced six batters and threw 33 pitches, was the difference-maker for Clevinger, who walked two and struck out one in the bottom of the first.

"It tightened up and never warmed back up on him," Tingler said (h/t J.P. Hoornstra of the Southern California News Group).

The Padres announced Clevinger would get the ball for Game 1 on Tuesday when they released their 28-player roster. The 29-year-old was hurt in his last regular-season outing, closing a year that saw him go 3-2 with a 3.02 ERA, 1.15 WHIP, and 40 strikeouts through 41.2 innings. He finished his season with San Diego after he was dealt from Cleveland at the trade deadline.

San Diego's second starter, Dinelson Lamet, missed the wild-card games and did not make the roster for the NLDS.

San Diego Padres starting pitcher Mike Clevinger is on the team's roster for the American League Divisional Series vs. the Los Angeles Dodgers and is the team's Game 1 starter: 

October Sunshine. ☀️ pic.twitter.com/X9takhuKA2

— San Diego Padres (@Padres) October 6, 2020

Clevinger, like Dinelson Lamet, missed the team's Wild Card Series against the St. Louis Cardinals because of injury. Lamet will also miss the NLDS.  

Clevinger's return is huge for a San Diego staff that struggled against St. Louis, giving up 20 runs in three games. 

The 29-year-old was excellent in the 2020 regular season, finishing 3-2 with a 3.02 ERA, 1.15 WHIP and 40 strikeouts in 41.2 innings between Cleveland and San Diego. The Padres acquired him ahead of the trade deadline along with Greg Allen and a player to be named later for Josh Naylor, Austin Hedges, Cal Quantrill, Gabriel Arias, Joey Cantillo and Owen Miller.

Being without Lamet remains a major blow, however. The 28-year-old was San Diego's best picture in the regular season, finishing 3-1 with a 2.09 ERA, 0.86 ERA and 93 strikeouts in 69 innings. He was superb, and the trio of Lamet, Clevinger and Zach Davies gave the Padres a formidable top three in their starting rotation.

Instead, the Padres may need to turn again to Chris Paddack, who was rocked by St. Louis (six runs in 2.1 innings) in his lone start this postseason. 

Granted, pitching may be a moot point given San Diego's explosive lineup, led by Fernando Tatis Jr. and Manny Machado. But the Dodgers were baseball's best team this year and are as balanced as it gets. If San Diego's rotation fares as poorly as it did against a less explosive offensive Cardinals team, the Padres will be in trouble. 

Mike Clevinger has been out since Sept. 23 with an arm injury, but he could return to help the San Diego Padres in the National League Division Series matchup against the Los Angeles Dodgers, according to ESPN's Pedro Gomez.

The NL West rivals are set to begin their five-game series on Tuesday at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas.

Clevinger missed the Wild Card Series against the Atlanta Braves after an elbow posterior impingement caused him to leave his final start of the season after just one inning. He was scratched from his previous start due to an arm injury as well.

He took part in a bullpen session Wednesday, but there were still "significant concerns" that could keep him out the entire postseason, per Jeff Passan of ESPN.

It seems he is now trending in the right direction, although it remains to be seen if he can work his way back to the mound.

The 29-year-old would make a significant impact if he can play after producing a 3.02 ERA in eight starts between the Padres and Cleveland Indians. He made only four starts for San Diego after a midseason trade but pitched well with a 2.84 ERA, including seven shutout innings against the San Francisco Giants in his final full game.

The Padres came from behind to beat the St. Louis Cardinals in the first round, but they will need all the help they can get to beat the Dodgers, which had the best record in baseball this season at 43-17 and led the majors in runs scored.

Considering none of their starters made it through three innings last round, adding another reliable starter could go a long way.

SAN DIEGO — One-part magician and one-part savant, Fernando Tatis Jr. sailed jet-like, stretched cat-like and stuck Paul DeJong's soft, knuckling liner flypaper-like to take his team to the bottom of the eighth inning.

Walking off the mound, reliever Drew Pomeranz turned, gawked, clapped, smiled and pointed at what's become one of the most talked-about scenic viewpoints in all of San Diego.

One part dancer and one part baker, when the Padres' national coming-out party ended with a 4-zip bullpenning whitewashing of the St. Louis Cardinals on Friday night, Tatis Jr. shimmied with teammates for a photo op in front of the mound while his words, "Take the Cake," flashed in giant letters on the big-screen scoreboard behind them.

Book it: The Padres won their first postseason series in 22 years, and for the second night in a row, honking car horns jubilantly sounded late into the night on the San Diego city streets surrounding Petco Park. Whooping, hollering and cheering made it a true cacophony. And it was a long time coming: Not since the Padres ousted Atlanta in the 1998 NLCS has this city celebrated a baseball winner in October.

All parts crackling energy, Tatis Jr. is the most electric player in the game and the man who is taking the lead in plugging the Padres back into the national hardball conversation. Yes, owners Ron Fowler and Peter Seidler laid out $144 million over eight years for Eric Hosmer, $300 million over 10 years for Manny Machado and $83 million over six years for Wil Myers...but, my goodness, it is Tatis Jr. who by far leads the new brown-clad Padres in turning their opponents blue.

"Off the charts," said catcher Austin Nola, who was acquired from Seattle at the Aug. 31 trade deadline by general manager A.J. Preller, who himself is one-part mad scientist and one-part riverboat gambler. "You can watch it. It brings everybody's energy level up when he's so enthusiastic playing the game.    

"I was very blessed to play in the Dominican Republic this offseason, to play for his dad and to be around the family, and it was a blessing. I learned every day from that Tatis family. It's a special family."

The last team to punch their ticket to a division series, these Padres rank first in any discussion of the most exciting young teams in baseball. Start with Tatis Jr. and move to Machado. The left side of the Padres infield is a nightly collection of defensive highlights. And after a disappointing first season with the Padres—the man himself said he played like something that looks and smells like, well, you know—Machado rededicated himself over the winter and, with no more off-the-field business distractions now that free agency is in his rearview mirror, played like an MVP.

The Padres set an MLB record by crushing grand slams in four consecutive games in August and then became the first MLB team ever to smash five grand slams in six games two days later. A new nickname, Slam Diego, was hatched.

Muscling up returned in Game 2 of this Wild Card Series with St. Louis on Thursday, when, facing elimination and trailing 6-2 going into the bottom of the sixth inning, Tatis Jr. turned on the power again. He led off with a homer, Machado followed with another, and bing, bam, boom, next thing anybody knew, the Padres, who ranked fourth in the majors in homers this season, belted five long balls over three innings to stun St. Louis 11-9 in one of the most epic games ever in San Diego.

Tatis Jr. and Myers hit two each during the onslaught, becoming the only teammates with two homers apiece in a postseason game this side of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, who did it in the 1932 World Series against the Chicago Cubs (yes, the same game in which Ruth famously and allegedly called his shot).

Then came Game 3, tame by comparison but just as stunning in a wholly different way: The Padres entered this series with their top two starters injured—Mike Clevinger and Dinelson Lamet—and had already used 17 pitchers in the first two games. With no other choices, first-year manager Jayce Tingler pieced together his pitching again like a kid carefully building a Lego structure. Snap, snap, snap. Result? Nine pitchers combining to shut out the Redbirds.

The Padres became the first team to ever use eight or more pitchers in three consecutive postseason games and the first team ever to use nine pitchers in the same postseason series.

Making all this success even more improbable: Preller swapped out his entire catching staff mid-stream at the trade deadline, dispatching offensive-liability Austin Hedges to Cleveland and young Luis Torrens to Seattle and acquiring Nola and Jason Castro (from the Angels). Nola caught all 27 innings against the Cardinals, handling every pitcher as if they were longtime acquaintances.

Sometimes it seemed as if they were making it up as they went along—both against the Cardinals and throughout the season. Preller moved a total 27 players in and out at the trade deadline, and the Padres added eight new players to their major league roster. And this was a team that already was winning. And they won some more.

"They play the game like a bunch of little kids," closer Trevor Rosenthal, acquired from Kansas City, said after closing Game 2 on Thursday. That includes even the old graybeards. In inventing a way to work through Friday's winner-take-all game, Tingler summoned the 11-year veteran and bullpen mainstay Craig Stammen, 36, to make his first start since 2010.

"We had a ton of discussion, a ton of discussion," Tingler said. "What's the right move? You look at the analytics. But at the end of the day, you bank on the man. ... There is a ton of belief in the man. At the end of the day, we looked at numbers, we had a tone of options and we just gave it to a trustworthy man."

That, too, is Preller's Padres: A team that smartly and crisply blends modern analytics with old-school scouting. It's a mix that works well, and in this one singular decision, Stammen rewarded the trust.

"It felt similar to my major league debut," Stammen said. "I told myself: 'Why would you ever be nervous? This is every kid's dream, to get the ball in the playoffs against the St. Louis Cardinals.'"

He retired five of the game's first six batters and the parade to the mound commenced. And on the sad, sad day that Hall of Famer Bob Gibson died from pancreatic cancer, Cardinals ace Jack Flaherty, who counted Gibson among his mentors, brought his A-game. He tossed six complete innings, giving up just one run and striking out eight.

There was no score into the fifth when, yes, Tatis Jr. rapped a one-out double and scored two batters later when Hosmer drilled another double. The Padres added three more in the seventh and eighth.

It was Tatis Jr. who, way back in July when baseball resumed following its long COVID-19 suspension, notified the world that the Padres were "aiming for the big cake."

It was a precocious statement for someone from a club that had produced only one winning season in the past 12 (2010).

But in his brief 143 games in the majors, if there's one thing we've learned, it's never to doubt Tatis Jr. Already, now, he's equaled Mike Trout’s playoff appearances—three games—and Trout has played in 1,252 games over 10 seasons. And Tatis Jr. now has accomplished one thing poor Trout hasn't in winning a playoff series.

Tatis!

The @Padres are 3 outs away. 👀 #Postseason pic.twitter.com/wj1byhDEwg

— MLB (@MLB) October 3, 2020

Now it's on to the neutral site in Arlington, Texas, for a division series against the Dodgers. After finishing 36 games behind the Dodgers in the NL West in 2019, the Padres shaved that to a six-game deficit in this abbreviated 60-game season. Los Angeles won six of the 10 games between the two clubs this year, and even with their current momentum, the Padres know they must successfully measure themselves against the Dodgers before claiming anything as their own.

"We have prove to ourselves that we can play with those guys," Hosmer conceded. "We know we have go through them to get to the World Series."

So let the proceedings begin, and next week truly will be divisional series week: All four playoff series will be intradivision, Padres and Dodgers (NL West rivals), Braves and Marlins (NL East), Yankees and Rays (AL East) and Astros and Athletics (AL West).

The weird thing will be the Padres and Dodgers, roughly 120 miles apart, dueling in Texas. But then, nothing is normal this year, so why not?

As the Cardinals batted in the eighth Friday with their season melting away, a man stood on a high-rise balcony far beyond center field in Petco Park with a bullhorn, chanting into the night: "Here we go Padres, here we go! Here we go Padres, here we go!"

A few stories below and a few minutes later, Tatis Jr. went airborne for DeJong's ball and for the Cardinals' throats. There they went, the Padres and Tatis Jr., a beautiful future finally close enough to reach out and grab.

                            

Scott Miller covers Major League Baseball as a national columnist for Bleacher Report. Follow Scott on Twitter and talk baseball.

Fernando Tatis Jr. is the mayor of Slam Diego. 

The young superstar and his Padres teammates found their power Thursday night, blasting four home runs—including two from Tatis—in a wild 11-9 comeback win over the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 2 of the National League Wild Card Series. 

The Cardinals shot out to a 4-0 lead after the second inning behind Kolten Wong's two-run homer, jumping out to an early advantage like they did in Game 1. 

The @Cardinals have come out swingin'. #Postseason pic.twitter.com/D0yleMt3bt

— MLB (@MLB) October 1, 2020

But this time, the Padres had an answer, responding with back-to-back shots from Tatis (three-run homer) and Manny Machado (solo) in the bottom of the sixth, tying the game after trailing 6-2. It was the fourth time this season the superstar duo has gone back-to-back.

TATIS!!!

The @Padres are back in it. pic.twitter.com/1XwJFbksfQ

— MLB (@MLB) October 2, 2020

TIE. GAME. pic.twitter.com/zPDH4Kpt3d

— MLB (@MLB) October 2, 2020

Wil Myers and Tatis appeared to put the finishing touches on the game in the seventh, each homering. 

All the way back.

These @Padres are incredible. #Postseason pic.twitter.com/MTus9kQo54

— MLB (@MLB) October 2, 2020

FERNANDO. TATIS. JR. pic.twitter.com/cHQnWmbETX

— MLB (@MLB) October 2, 2020

The BAT FLIP by @tatis_jr 😂🤣😳🤭

— Russell Wilson (@DangeRussWilson) October 2, 2020

Tatis bat-flipping an oppo-taco... Love it. It's the playoffs, you know? https://t.co/rpwMRLBlY0

— Troy Renck (@TroyRenck) October 2, 2020

Undeterred, the Cardinals pushed across two runs in the eighth on two sacrifice flies and another run in the ninth on a Paul Goldschmidt dinger. Luckily for the Padres, Myers iced the game with a two-run jack in the eighth.

Wil Myers goes deep and joins Fernando Tatis Jr. with two home runs in this game!

They're the 2nd pair of teammates in postseason history to each have 2 HR in the same game, joining Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in the 1932 World Series 🤯 pic.twitter.com/DRh290q7rH

— ESPN (@espn) October 2, 2020

Trevor Rosenthal came in and secured a nervy save, setting up a Game 3 on Friday. 

                  

Key Players

Fernando Tatis Jr., SD: 3-for-5, two homers, five RBI

Manny Machado, SD: 1-for-5, one homer

Tommy Pham, SD: 4-for-5

Wil Myers, SD: 2-for-5, two homers, four RBI

Kolten Wong, STL: 1-for-4, one homer, four RBI

Adam Wainwright, STL: 3.1 innings, six hits, two runs, two walks, three strikeouts

Matt Carpenter, STL: 1-for-3, three runs

Harrison Bader, STL: 1-for-3, two RBI, one run

Paul Goldschmidt, STL: 2-for-5, one homer

                  

Tatis Is A Stone-Cold Superstar

For the second straight game, the Padres found themselves in a hole. Starting pitcher Chris Paddack was downright awful Wednesday. Zach Davies didn't do much better Thursday, giving up four runs in two innings. 

That's it for Zach Davies, with the two #Padres starters lasting a total of 4.1 innings in these two games against the #STLCards , giving up 13 hits and 10 earned runs for an ugly 20.77 ERA.

— Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) October 2, 2020

Zach Davies had not allowed more than three runs or gone fewer than five innings in 12 starts this season.

With the Padres down 4-0, Pierce Johnson is in to start the third inning.

— Kevin Acee (@sdutKevinAcee) October 1, 2020

But the pitching won't be the main storyline because Tatis saved San Diego's season. He's a special, generational talent. He's also a lot of fun to watch.  

Fernando Tatis Jr. is the 2nd-youngest player in NL history with a multi-HR game in the #Postseason. Only Andruw Jones in 1996 was younger. pic.twitter.com/koVkm6Yz2U

— MLB Stats (@MLBStats) October 2, 2020

Moments before sparking the Padres with a three-run HR to get them back in the game and going back to back with Manny Machado, here's Fernando Tatis Jr. watching Giovanny Gallegos warm up ...

He's yawning! A 21-year-old in that spot, and he has no heart rate.

HOW?! pic.twitter.com/NKHFoVlz5y

— Jason Catania (@JayCat11) October 2, 2020

Fernando Tatis Jr. has changed everything that was being said about him for two days ... simply by being who he was for most of the past two months.

— Kevin Acee (@sdutKevinAcee) October 2, 2020

Tatis Jr makes me feel so old. And gooooood grief that power 🤯. Cardinals have totally blown this - but that kid hit two absolute piss missles.

— Chris Vernon (@ChrisVernonShow) October 2, 2020

The Padres posted more comeback wins (22) than any other team in baseball during the regular season, in large part due to their electrifying offense. Make it 23, thanks in large part to Tatis. 

                   

A Taxed Cardinals Bullpen Gave Out in Game 2

The Cardinals used six pitchers in Wednesday's 7-4 win, giving up just one run. It showed Thursday. 

This time, the Cardinals cycled through eight pitchers after Wainwright went just 3.1 innings. And this time, the bullpen allowed nine runs to come across the plate. 

Both of these teams have pushed their pitching staffs to the limits in this series. The Padres' starter for Friday is a question mark with Mike Clevinger and Dinelson Lamet out of the series. The one advantage the Cardinals might have left is a good start from Jack Flaherty. 

If he gets rocked early and the Cardinals need to rely on the bullpen for a long stretch again, however, they're in trouble. 

             

What's Next?

Game 3 will be Friday at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN. 

San Diego Padres starter Mike Clevinger is not on the Padres' roster as they host the St. Louis Cardinals for the National League West wild-card round, and he could be out for the entire postseason, per ESPN's Jeff Passan. 

Clevinger, who is nursing an arm injury, is on the taxi squad along with presumed Game 2 starter Dinelson Lamet.

Chris Paddack will start for San Diego in Game 1 on Wednesday. 

The 29-year-old Clevinger exited a start on Sept. 23 after one inning and was later diagnosed with a right elbow sprain. A 23-pitch bullpen outing on Tuesday did little to ease concerns about his health, according to Passan. 

Since arriving in San Diego from Cleveland at the trade deadline, Clevinger collected a 2.84 ERA and 0.89 WHIP while fanning 19 batters in as many innings through four starts for the Padres.

The circumstances that brought him to San Diego were unideal: after his teammates accused him of lying to them about breaking curfew on a road trip, he was sent to the alternate site alongside pitcher Zach Plesac, who was also involved. The transaction that sent him west also included outfielder Greg Allen and a player to be named later in return for six players from San Diego. 

Lamet was expected to take the ball from Clevinger for Game 2 of the series after finishing the regular season with a 2.09 ERA, but he left the Padres' game Friday with bicep tightness.

Zach Davies, Garrett Richards, and Adrian Morejon are options for the Padres, who finished the season with the second-best record in the National League at 37-23, as they try to rebuild their scrapped rotation hours before the postseason begins. 

San Diego Padres pitcher Mike Clevinger will undergo an MRI after leaving Wednesday's start against the Los Angeles Angels with a biceps injury.

Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune reported the team believes Clevinger may have a muscle strain or tendinitis that could keep him out of the rotation for the postseason.

The Padres scratched Clevinger from a start Sunday due to biceps tightness, but he threw a bullpen session Monday without issue.

If Clevinger does indeed miss the remainder of the season, it'll be a crushing blow for a Padres team that views itself as a World Series contender. San Diego's 34-22 record is the second-best in the National League behind only the Los Angeles Dodgers, its NL West rival that's an MLB-best 39-16. 

Clevinger is viewed as perhaps the lynchpin of the Padres' title hopes. He's an ace who was acquired at the deadline to help put them over the top in short series. The 29-year-old has posted a 2-1 record with a 2.51 ERA and 0.94 WHIP while striking out 17 batters in 18 innings with the Padres.

Zach Davies and Dinelson Lamet will move to the top of the rotation with Clevinger out. 

For the first time since 2006, the San Diego Padres will play in October after clinching a postseason berth with Sunday's 7-4 victory over the Seattle Mariners in 11 innings.

The Padres have been the breakout team of 2020 with their roster of exciting young talent and vivid personalities who shine on the field. 

No player better encapsulates the spirit of this team than shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr., who's arguably the face of Major League Baseball in just his second season. He's the presumptive favorite to win National League MVP with a .310/.407/.655 slash line, 15 homers and 40 RBI. 

🚨 @tatis_jr grand slam 🚨 pic.twitter.com/agtKnvQ7kH

— MLB (@MLB) August 18, 2020

The 21-year-old is just the tip of the iceberg for what has made this Padres team so good. Second baseman Jake Cronenworth has the inside track on NL Rookie of the Year with a .305/.369/.523 slash line.

No NL team has had the MVP and Rookie of the Year winners in the same season since the 1998 Chicago Cubs (Sammy Sosa and Kerry Wood). 

Their big free-agent additions, Eric Hosmer and Manny Machado, have been terrific this season. The former is currently slugging a career-best .533. 

Machado, meanwhile, is on pace to set career highs in batting average (.322), on-base percentage (.384) and slugging percentage (.619). 

General manager A.J. Preller took advantage of his team's deep farm system by making multiple deals leading up to the Aug. 31 trade deadline to add talent to help their playoff push. 

Per The Ringer's Ben Lindbergh, Preller added or traded a total of 26 players before the trade deadline. 

The biggest move involved San Diego acquiring Mike Clevinger from the Cleveland Indians. Starting pitching depth has been one area the Padres haven't been strong in 2020. Chris Paddack and Garrett Richards both have ERAs north of 4.20. 

Clevinger posted a 3.20 ERA in 101 games over five seasons in Cleveland. 

Playing in the same division as the Los Angeles Dodgers makes it difficult to really stand out, but the Padres have been the talk of MLB all season.

Their playoff appearance this season stems from years of building their minor league depth through trades, drafts and international signings that made their farm system the envy of the 29 other teams at the start of 2019.

San Diego has been building toward its moment in the spotlight all season. It will finally get the stage in October for the first time in 14 years.  

The San Diego Padres announced first baseman Eric Hosmer suffered a fractured left index finger during Monday's game against the Colorado Rockies. 

Hosmer's first season with the team fell well short of expectations. According to FanGraphs, his WAR dropped from 4.1 in 2017 to minus-0.1.

His raw numbers improved in 2019 as he batted .265 with a .425 slugging percentage, 22 home runs and 99 RBI. Hosmer's weighed on-base average (.309) remained stagnant, and his weighted runs created plus (91) were the second-lowest of his career.

His performance in 2020 has been encouraging, though. He's slugging .542 with eight home runs and 32 RBI through 34 games.

Hosmer's durability was likely one of the reasons San Diego's front office felt comfortable making such a large investment in him. The 30-year-old has appeared in 150-plus MLB games seven times in his first nine years. The exceptions were 2011, when he started the season in the minors, and 2014, when he fractured his right hand.

The Padres' fortunes were trending upward heading into the 2020 season, and playoff expansion eased their potential path to the postseason for the first time since 2006. Losing Hosmer shouldn't put a big dent in those aspirations.