PHILADELPHIA — Elation. Disaster.
Deafening cheers. Silence. Boos. Deafening cheers. Tears.
Glad, sad, mad.
Dig the nails in and hang on.
“Every day in the postseason feels like on the brink, to tell you the truth,” Padres manager Bob Melvin said Saturday before Game 4 of the NL Championship Series.
Every day. How about every inning?
The playoffs, they are a wild ride.
One that the Padres and their fans might not have to endure much longer.
A 10-6 loss to the Philadelphia Phillies on Saturday — in a game that was from the start going to be remembered fondly by one fan base and be the source of nightmares for the other — has the Padres one loss from vacation.
In taking a 3-1 lead in the NLCS, the Phillies did to the Padres what the Padres had done to them three days earlier by coming back from a four-run deficit to win.
The Padres have lost consecutive games for the first time this postseason.
A victory by the Phillies here Sunday (11:37 a.m. PDT, FS1) would send them to the World Series. Should the Padres be able to win a game started by Zack Wheeler, against whom they have not scored a run in 21 2/3 innings over the past two years, the series will return to Petco Park for Game 6 on Monday evening.
“We only need to win one and get home,” Melvin said.
The Padres took a 4-0 lead in the top of the first Saturday. It was 4-3 when the first inning was over and 4-4 at the end of the fourth inning.
The Padres took a 6-4 lead in the top of the fifth inning. The Phillies led 8-6 after the bottom of the fifth and extended their lead to 9-6 in the sixth and 10-6 in the seventh.
“If you told me we were going to score six runs tonight,” Melvin said, “I’d probably feel pretty good.”
The strength of the Padres all season, including in the postseason, became their undoing Saturday as two starting pitchers were shelled.
Mike Clevinger gave up three runs and Sean Manaea five, Clevinger without recording an out in the first inning and Manaea while getting four outs between the fourth and fifth inning.
Both were starters who made significant contributions at times this season and had not pitched much in recent months because of injury (Clevinger) and ineffectiveness (Manaea).
The game began innocuously enough, with the first two Padres batters going down rather meekly.
The first inning ended after 48 minutes with starting pitchers Bailey Falter and Clevinger having allowed seven runs on six hits and five walks while throwing 39 pitches between them.
It was just the second time in postseason history both starters in a game did not get out of the first inning. The previous occurrence was in the 1932 World Series.
The action began with Manny Machado hitting a home run, silencing the crowd that had spent the moments leading up to and during his one-pitch at-bat chanting, “Manny sucks.”
A Josh Bell single, nine-pitch walk by Jake Cronenworth and Brandon Drury two-run double sent Falter walking off the mound. Ha-Seong Kim greeted Connor Brogdon with a single that drove in Drury and put the Padres up 4-0.
Citizens Bank Park was as quiet as a building filled with 45,467 people could be without actually trying. It would not be that way for long.
Trent Grisham struck out to end the inning, the first of 10 straight Padres to make outs.
The Phillies would score three runs and be clear of Clevinger before making an out.
Kyle Schwarber began the bottom of the first by lining an 0-2 curveball the other way to left field for a single. Rhys Hoskins halved the Padres’ lead by sending a full-count fastball to the seats beyond left field. A walk by J.T. Realmuto and double by Bryce Harper brought Clevinger’s night to a close.
Nick Martinez, who began the season in the starting rotation but has been a bullpen savior since June, stranded Harper and retired nine straight Phillies to get the Padres through the third inning without further damage.
With Martinez having thrown 43 pitches, his most since June 22, Manaea came in to start the fourth.
Nick Castellanos sent Manaea’s second pitch to the gap in left-center for a double and scored the tying run on a two-out single by Bryson Stott.
After Jurickson Profar’s one-out walk, a Padres player again quieted an impolite chant with a home run.
Juan Soto answered a prolonged “Soto Sucks” with his first postseason homer to give the Padres a 6-4 lead.
It was short-lived and would be their last one. They would get just three more hits after the Phillies took an 8-4 lead in the fifth on Hoskins’ second two-run homer, a walk to Realmuto, Harper’s second RBI double and an RBI single by Castellanos. The last of those hits was off Luis Garcia, as Manaea’s final batter had been Harper.
Schwarber homered off Garcia in the sixth, and Realmuto homered off Steven Wilson in the seventh.
The Padres’ lone win came in the series was Wednesday afternoon in Game 2 at Petco Park, when they overcame a four-run deficit to win 8-5.
The Phillies won 2-0 in Game 1, which was started by Wheeler, who shut them out on one hit over seven innings.
The Phillies won 4-2 in Game 2 despite the Padres scoring two runs with help from a pair of errors and having the tying run at least up to bat in the final four innings.
The Padres have ace Yu Darvish starting and the back end of their bullpen rested for Sunday.
