Padres routed by Diamondbacks at start of crucial week

Kevin Acee, The San Diego Union-Tribune on Jul 7, 2026

Published in Baseball

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The night began strangely. It turned ugly.

The Padres returned home Sunday night having won a game after eight straight losses, talking about how they saw positives and were looking to create momentum.

There were no signs of either on Monday, as they put up almost no resistance in a shockingly easy 8-0 victory by the Diamondbacks.

“That’s not good enough,” Jake Cronenworth said. “Every guy in here, including myself, will probably say the same thing. Win yesterday, come back home, important homestand before the All-Star break, and we’re shut out. Can’t happen.”

Virtually the entire night was the opposite of what the Padres envisioned as they began the final week before the All-Star break.

“I think we’ve got to play our best baseball and take care of our game,” Manny Machado said Monday afternoon. “If we do that, we could put ourselves in a good spot. So keep doing that. Not really worry about who we’re playing, but go out there and try to play the best baseball tonight and leave it on the field and do that for the next seven games.”

Afterward, he was in no mood to analyze.

“We just played an overall bad game,” Machado said. “There was a lot to it.”

From the misplayed triple and hit batter that began the game through the three-run homer that essentially put it away, through the Padres’ string of uncompetitive at-bats and considering all that is at stake for them at this point, what happened Monday was instead practically unconscionable.

“If anything, it should get guys to dig a little deeper and find something a little extra,” Cronenworth said. “I know it’s July, but this is a super, super important stretch of our season, and this is when we need to dig deep the most.”

Both teams began the game with a 44-45 record and four games back in the wild-card standings, the last of the contenders.

At least one of them will in the coming weeks likely be exposed as a pretender.

Anyone who saw a moment of Monday’s game would put their money on it being the Padres who disappear from relevance in short order.

The Padres’ starting pitching woes continued, as Walker Buehler allowed seven runs in five innings one start after yielding nine runs in four innings.

“We get back home (after getting) a win yesterday and you kind of want to carry momentum,” Buehler said. “And I just deflate our team kind of right off the jump.”

He worked five innings Monday only because it made no sense for him not to stay in the game and wear as much of the beatdown as possible. Down 6-0 by the third inning, it would not have been prudent for Craig Stammen to manage for the win.

The Padres offense performed like it agreed.

Their eight singles, including two by Cronwenworth and two by Jackson Merrill, came in eight different innings. They got one runner into scoring position.

Brandon Pfaadt, who entered the game with a 5.40 ERA and had been shuffled in and out of the Diamondbacks’ rotation and even sent to Triple-A, threw 72 pitches in his five innings. Ryan Thompson worked the next two innings, and Drey Jameson closed out the game.

Pfaadt was working with a cushion from the start.

Merrill made a bad read on Ketel Marte’s line drive to center field on the game’s third pitch, going straight back while the ball spun to the left behind him and Marte ran to third. Buehler’s next pitch hit Geraldo Perdomo in the foot.

With Corbin Carroll at the plate, Perdomo took off for second base while Buehler was on the mound. Buehler turned late and fired a throw ostensibly toward second base that sailed into center field and allowed Marte to trot home.

Buehler got two outs before Max Kepler grounded a single through the left side to score Perdomo.

The Diamondbacks scored four runs in the third inning on a double, two singles and Kepler’s home run, all in succession with one out.

Perdomo homered with two outs in the fourth.

Buehler made it through the fifth before Alek Jacob took over in the sixth and surrendered a home run to Nolan Arenado, the first batter he faced.

Jacob made it through the eighth before Ron Marinaccio worked the ninth.

“Didn’t look good, didn’t feel good, doesn’t taste good,” Stammen said. “We’ve got to wash that one off quick and get back at it and get the focus and the attitude that we had, even in L.A. … It is a disappointing performance. It doesn’t define the rest of the homestand. And our job is to bounce back and be ready to go and give a better effort tomorrow night.”

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