SAN DIEGO — They have flopped before, countless wonderful summers cruelly melted into autumn ashes.
But they’ve never blown it like this.
They have been embarrassed before, many memorable summer marches ruined by staggering October stumbles.
But they’ve never been humiliated like this.
Barely a week after setting a franchise record with 111 regular-season victories, the biggest winners in Dodgers history have blundered into a vastly different moniker.
The Biggest Losers.
On a rare rainy Saturday night at San Diego’s Petco Park, an even stranger event occurred — the sight of the San Diego Padres dancing across the field after sucker punching the Dodgers into next season.
Little brother has knocked out big brother. The nail has spiked the hammer. The shadow has eclipsed the sun.
In a 5-3 comeback victory, the Padres clinched the best-of-five National League Division Series three games to one while sending the Dodgers to the darkest corners of their legacy.
This is the biggest disappointment in Dodger history. This is the biggest upset in Dodger history. In strictly a baseball sense, this is arguably the lowest point in Dodger history.
The Dodgers won more regular-season games than all but three teams in major league history, yet their postseason lasted all of four nights. The Dodgers won 22 more games than the Padres during the long summer, yet they could beat them only once in four October tries.
Based on difference in regular-season winning percentage, this was the second-biggest upset in postseason history, and the biggest in 116 years. In other words, chants of “Beat L.A” and the sight of thousands of flapping yellow towels will live in Dodger lore forever.
This is bad. This is really bad.
It ended worse than one could possibly imagine as an array of relievers from the Dodgers’ revolving bullpen blew a 3-0 lead by allowing five Padres runs in the seventh inning after cruising starter Tyler Anderson was pulled after five. The go-ahead hit was a two-run single by Jake Cronenworth after baserunner Juan Soto was allowed to walk into scoring position at second base.
This painfully punctuates the narrative scripted by the Dodgers’ postseason failures during their past 10 years of regular-season domination. This is the best example of why many fans have been unable to enjoy the six months of winning without waiting for the other shoe to drop.
And this time that shoe belongs to the San Diego freaking Padres?
Ten postseason appearances, nine postseason failures, yet none quite like this one.
This is worse than Clayton Kershaw’s meltdowns against the St. Louis Cardinals. This is worse than Corey Seager failing to cover third base against the New York Mets.
This is worse than being overrun by the Chicago Cubs. This is worse than Howie Kendrick’s grand slam for the Washington Nationals. This is worse than the front office’s pitching mismanagement against the Atlanta Braves.
This is even worse than being cheated by the Houston Astros in 2017 and being whipped by the Boston Red Sox in 2018 because, well, at least both of those defeats were in the World Series. In each of those years, at least they won two playoff rounds.
This time, even with the greatest run differential in baseball in 83 years, the Dodgers couldn’t even win two playoff games.
And to think, this was going to be the season the story finally changed. This was going to be the season they would overcome the stigma of having won just one shortened-season championship during these last 10 years. This was the season they were going to win a World Series after a full season for the first time in 34 years.
This was a Dodgers team so loaded that in March, manager Dave Roberts guaranteed a World Series championship on “The Dan Patrick Show.”
“We are winning the World Series this year,” he told Patrick. “Put it on record.”
Put those words in the trash, along with every other belief about this supposedly greatest of Dodger teams. Finally confronted with the sort of playoff pressure that was missing during their steamrolling summer, the Dodgers cracked against a Padres team playing its best baseball with nothing to lose.
The starry Dodgers batting order led by the Big Three of Mookie Betts, Trea Turner and Freddie Freeman? The Padres pitching spun them into the ground.
The once-feared Dodger rotation led by Julio Urías and Clayton Kershaw? The Padres knocked around Kershaw and then took advantage of a thin staff that wasn’t built to compensate for the loss of ace Walker Buehler and injury-weakened Tony Gonsolin and Dustin May.
The professional Dodger fielding? A botched grounder by Trea Turner basically cost them Game 2, and they never seemed truly sharp again.
As with every recent postseason failure, Dodger fans will now play the blame game, and once again it will all fall on the shoulders of manager Dave Roberts, who made several questionable pitching moves in Game 4, from removing Tyler Anderson too soon, to inserting Alex Vesia to face Cronenworth after reliever Yency Almonte had already thrown one pitch, to ignoring his best reliever Evan Phillips until it was too late.
Meanwhile, the Padres advance to the National League Championship Series in a battle that will highlight a renewed franchise that has truly fought its way out of the big blue shadow.
“I think it’s about time that we start talking about San Diego as a sport town,” former Padre pitcher Jake Peavy said. “We’ve lost the Chargers. This is the only game in town. The Padre fans are absolutely showing out, from Del Mar on down … it feels good. It feels electric.”
As for the Dodgers, well, for the ninth time in 10 years, they’ve turned out the lights early on a potentially bright postseason.
But it’s never felt this dark.
