'Sky's the limit': Padres look ahead after disappointing NLDS loss

LOS ANGELES -- Jackson Merrill was the last one off the railing.

Game 5 of the National League Division Series was over. So was the Padres’ season -- in agonizing fashion. Beyond the mound, the Dodgers celebrated. The Padres -- empty-handed after a season-ending 2-0 loss on Friday night -- could only watch. One by one, they retreated to the visiting clubhouse at Dodger Stadium. Merrill was the last to go.

“I just didn’t want to leave,” the Padres' rookie phenom would later say. “I wasn’t really sitting there grieving or sulking or anything. I was just sitting there wanting to stay on the field. It ended pretty fast.”

Too fast. For a Padres team that spent the year building toward this moment, the ending was borderline unfathomable.

“There’s no way to explain the hard moments,” said Jurickson Profar. “Just sad for this team. We had everything to go all the way. But -- baseball. They played better than us the last two games, and now we’re going home.”

The 2024 Padres did not enter the season with outside expectations suggesting they could push the Dodgers in the NL West, then to the brink of elimination in the NLDS. But the 2024 Padres also regularly made it clear how they felt about those outside expectations.

They swung trades early and often to bolster their roster. In the second half, they jelled, and rolled into the postseason on the strength of the best record in baseball after the All-Star break. They easily dispatched the Braves in the NL Wild Card Series.

Quite a run for a team that had been mostly written off at the outset. Which made the ending on Friday night so positively agonizing. Nightmarish, even.

“There's a lot of emotion,” said Padres manager Mike Shildt. “Mixture, obviously. A ton of disappointment in the end result. But nothing but absolute respect and admiration for our entire club. It's a club that from day one poured everything they had into this -- every single guy.”

From a roster-building standpoint, the Padres invested plenty into 2024. They traded a sizeable chunk of their farm system in-season. Those moves will come with a cost.

And yet -- in spite of that cost -- the Padres ended their 2024 season in a much better place than they were after the disappointments of '23. The future seems brighter. Gone are reports of clubhouse issues. The '24 Padres built something far different.

“We worked as a group all year to [create] a family here,” said Manny Machado. “I don’t think I’ve been part of a team that’s been as tight as this one. It’s a special group that we had.”

Said Merrill: “I think I found a deeper love for baseball. I really didn’t know the extent of how electric it can be and how much of a family you can build through an entire summer of it.”

There’s no better evidence of that brighter future than Merrill. He’s a 21-year-old rookie who burst onto the scene and helped lift the Padres. Meanwhile, among the trades the Padres made over the past 12 months, most of those players are back next year -- Dylan Cease, Luis Arraez, Jason Adam, Michael King.

The Padres’ long-term offensive core remains intact as well, starting with Machado, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Xander Bogaerts. At this point, it’s fair to throw Merrill into that category, too.

“We have a strong core here,” Tatis said. “Sky’s the limit and I have no doubt we’re going to be knocking on the door every single year. Can’t wait.”

That’s not to say the questions don’t exist. Profar elevated himself to All-Star status this year. He’s a pending free agent. Ha-Seong Kim will almost certainly decline his mutual option and join Profar in free agency. Joe Musgrove underwent Tommy John surgery on Friday.

The 2025 Padres probably won’t look that different. But they’ll look different.

“I want as many back as possible,” Merrill said.

Until then, the Padres will be left to rue the unthinkable ending to their season. After setting a franchise postseason record with a six-run second inning in Game 3, they didn’t score another run. San Diego ended its season with 24 scoreless innings -- its longest drought of the season and the longest by any team in the postseason since the 1991 Braves.

“I’m going to say bad timing,” Tatis said.

• 'Tremendous job' by LA silences Friars' bats

In years to come, Friday won’t be remembered as the missed opportunity. That came Wednesday at Petco Park. In 2022, the Padres beat the Dodgers twice at home to win the NLDS. Sure enough, they carried a 2-1 lead this year into Game 4 before a frenzied home crowd.

And they were thoroughly beaten, 8-0. On Friday, Yu Darvish was stellar over 6 2/3 innings. But the offense again came up short.

Afterward, a team that had recorded all manner of dramatic victories struggled to cope with the fact they couldn’t find one more. Players hugged and said somber goodbyes in the very clubhouse they’d celebrated a postseason-clinching triple play. It didn’t seem to make sense.

“This is the closest group I’ve ever played with,” said Jake Cronenworth. “It’s the closest thing to a family outside of our own. I think that’s why it hurts so bad.”