MILWAUKEE — This will be difficult.

After a crushing defeat, the San Diego Padres have to make a big lift.

They now have to fight to get the National League Division Series back to American Family Field, the place where they just spent a devastating weekend.

An out away from winning Game 2, the Padres lost Sunday when closer Mason Miller could not get the last of the six outs he was asked to deliver.

After Miller loaded the bases on three walks, Jackson Chourio scorched a ground ball up the middle that got past a diving Jake Cronenworth and into center field to bring in two runs and give the Milwaukee Brewers a 4-3 victory — and a daunting lead of two games to none in the series that requires three victories.

“I didn’t do my job today,” Miller said. “So instead of being here with a win and the series tied, we’re in a hole. So it feels pretty bad.”

The Padres are in win-or-go-home mode for as long as they can make the NLDS last.

The teams will play Game 3 at Petco Park on Tuesday night. And, if necessary, Game 4 would be there Wednesday.

A team that felt like it was fighting from out of a corner for most of the season’s final two months was saying all the right things about their resilience in a quiet clubhouse Sunday evening.

“I feel like that’s kind of the mentality we’ve been playing with all season,” Ty France said. “Not a lot of people expected us to be in this position. So for us to even be here, we’ve proved a lot of people wrong. But I feel like there’s still some more in the tank.”

However, they knew they had just lost in what was as close to a literal must-win situation as any non-elimination game can be.

Teams that go up 2-0 in a best-of-five series have gone on to win the series 89% of the time (83 of 93) since MLB introduced the format in 1969.

“Not many teams have done it,” Fernando Tatis Jr. said. “So there’s a reason why it’s so tough. … Obviously, we want it different. It’s a tough situation right here. But we’re going to battle out there and find a way to make it happen.”

Sunday’s kick to the midsection came a day after a stinging 3-2 loss.

In Game 1, the Padres went 1 for 9 with runners in scoring position and were pretty sure France hit a ball that would have been a go-ahead home run in the ninth inning had it not hit a roof cable and dropped into Chourio’s glove on the warning track.

“Got to win,” France said. “There’s no ifs, ands, or buts about it. We played two really good games, and it didn’t go our way. But go back home, play each game like it’s our last.”

The result Sunday was shocking, coming as it did against the pitcher who had made the Padres practically invincible in such situations.

The Padres were 77-1 when leading after eight innings during the regular season. Miller had converted 38 of his 41 save opportunities and posted a 1.67 ERA, allowing a run in just 12 of his 66 appearances.

“You’re always gonna feel good when Mason is on the mound,” Tatis said.

There were other things to look back at Sunday, including the fact that France’s two RBI singles were the Padres’ only hits in nine at-bats with runners in scoring position and they failed to convert more from the gifts the Brewers gave them.

With help from a pair of costly errors by a team that does not make many of them, the Padres held a 3-1 lead going into the bottom of the seventh.

An uncharacteristic error (actually two on the same play) by Cronenworth in that half-inning enabled the Brewers to cut the lead to 3-2.

Another defensive mistake by the Brewers in the eighth did not end up costing them, as the Padres failed to convert after Brewers first baseman Jake Bauers did not cover the bag and Samad Taylor’s sacrifice bunt attempt turned into a single and gave the Padres runners at first and second with no outs.

“Unable to quite punch through and put the game away a little bit there,” Stammen said.

The game began with both teams making a number of sterling plays to take away hits and with Padres starting pitcher Michael King even more dominant for a time than he had been in Game 1 of the NL wild-card series.

King followed the longest no-hit bid in Padres postseason history with the second-longest.

After allowing his first hit with one out in the seventh inning on Tuesday against the Chicago Cubs, he held the Brewers hitless for 4 2/3 innings Sunday.

It was then that Milwaukee reeled off three consecutive hits and halved what had been a 2-0 lead.

After being utterly dominant for the better part of five innings, King departed after hitting the first batter in the sixth inning.

Yuki Matsui took over and got three straight outs before yielding a single to start the seventh. He then got an out on a fly ball Jackson Merrill caught at the wall, but Matsui’s day finished with a walk.

Rodriguez relieved Matsui and appeared to get out of the seventh on David Hamilton’s grounder to Cronenworth at second base. The ball was hit softly enough and Hamilton is fast enough that Cronenworth rushed and bobbled the ball before getting off a wild throw.

“I probably should have just killed the play,” Cronenworth said. “I probably didn’t have a chance on him anyways.”

The bobble allowed Hamilton to reach base and Garrett Mitchell, who hit the leadoff single, to score. The bad throw got Hamilton to second base and Cooper Pratt, who had walked, to third before Rodriguez ended the inning with a groundout.

While he later allowed that there was a possibility he would have had Rodriguez start the eighth if Matsui had been able to finish the seventh, Padres manager Craig Stammen said the Padres essentially planned to use Miller for six outs because Adrian Morejón was unavailable a day after throwing 31 pitches over two innings. And they went to Miller because the Brewers’ 2-3-4 hitters were due up in the eighth.

He got through those batters on 12 pitches and used just two pitches to record the first out in the ninth before his command disappeared.

With that, the Padres gave away a game the Brewers had almost gifted them.

The Padres led by two runs twice.

They built the first lead against Brewers starter Logan Henderson.

The 24-year-old right-hander began the first inning by striking out Tatis and Dustin Harrison on nine pitches and getting ahead of Manny Machado 0-2.

Machado ended up working a walk on seven pitches before France also fell behind 0-2.

But Henderson bounced a changeup that skipped past catcher William Contreras, allowing Machado to jog to second base. And France lined the next pitch to right-center field to bring in Machado.

Henderson began the second inning struggling to throw strikes, walking Gavin Sheets at the start and Luis Campusano with one out. But Cronenworth and Tatis both hit the first pitch they saw to Chourio in left field.

That would be the first two of eight consecutive batters Henderson retired to get through the fourth.

That streak ended on Campusano’s soft line drive into left field, and the Padres ended up scoring again thanks to an error by one of the better infielders in the major leagues.

With Campusano on first base with one out, Tatis chopped a ball over the mound that seemed like it would be a certain double play, as all second baseman Brice Turang had to do was field the ball, step on the bag and throw to first base.

But the ball went under Turang’s glove and through his legs and into center field. Campusano ran to third base, and he ended up scoring on Harris’ fielder’s choice grounder.

Tatis was again involved in a Brewers bungle in the seventh, as he reached base when Hamilton mishandled his slow grounder to the left side on what appeared to be the second out.

After Harris flied out, Machado walked, and Ty France drove in Tatis with a single.

But they could not add on in the eighth. And in the ninth, the team that chased fewer pitches outside the strike zone than any team in the major leagues made Miller pay for his lack of command.

“They’re a great team,” Stammen said. “You saw how hard they battle us here in Milwaukee. But we like where we are when we play at home. We can defend our home field and then hopefully have a chance (for) a return trip back to Milwaukee.”

____

©2026 The San Diego Union-Tribune. Visit sandiegouniontribune.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.