SAN DIEGO -- Good teams win in different ways.

The Padres have a lineup filled with handsomely paid superstars, some of whom might be on their way to Cooperstown, many of whom have starred in All-Star Games and World Series. Brett Sullivan is not one of them. 

Sullivan is a journeyman, a 29-year-old catcher who spent eight seasons in the Minors before he finally earned his big league breakthrough last month. He’s in San Diego as a backup to Austin Nola, while Luis Campusano’s left thumb heals.

And he’s making a nice case to stick around.

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The Padres beat the Reds, 7-1, on Wednesday afternoon at Petco Park. You might as well call it the Brett Sullivan Game. The rookie backstop doubled (his first career extra-base hit), homered (his first career home run) and knocked in the game’s first four runs (his first career RBIs). 

“This team is just full of All-Stars,” Sullivan said. “Any way I can do my job -- catching, hitting, whatever it is -- it feels amazing just to even contribute.”

The Padres haven’t gotten much production out of the catcher spot this season. Their backstops entered play Wednesday hitting a combined .168, tied with Miami for the lowest mark in the Majors.

Sullivan changed that in a big way. With two men aboard in the bottom of the second inning, he laced a double into the right-field corner to plate two runs. Two innings later, he came to the plate with a man aboard and two outs in the fourth.

The Reds had given starter Luis Cessa a quick hook, calling for left-hander Alex Young with three Padres lefties due up. Sullivan was one of them, and when Young left a fastball on the inner third, Sullivan turned on it, launching it to the right-field seats.

“Seeing that ball get out was a dream come true,” Sullivan said. “I definitely heard the fans. I tried to soak it in as much as I could, but I kind of blacked out a little bit.”

The Padres had a four-run lead, and that was plenty for right-hander Seth Lugo, who pitched six innings of one-run ball, lowering his ERA to 3.21 this season. Juan Soto’s bases-clearing double in the sixth put the game out of reach, and the Padres could cruise into an off-day on a winning note for the first time in 2023.

It’s a much-needed off-day, too. It’s the first time this season the Padres will get to spend an off-day at home in San Diego. After their taxing weekend in Mexico City, it will also give them a chance to reset their bullpen ahead of a highly anticipated three-game series against the Dodgers this weekend.

But manager Bob Melvin was quick to note one other added benefit of the off-day for Sullivan.

“You have a game like that, and it resonates with you,” Melvin said. “It’s great that we have an off-day, too, so that he can answer all his phone calls and texts.”

Fifteen minutes after the game, Sullivan stood at his locker, beaming, answering questions from reporters. Team staffers had managed to retrieve the baseball. He planned to give it to either his dad or his son -- he wasn’t sure yet.

As he answered questions, Sullivan’s phone sat at his locker chair, buzzing. How many messages had he received? He hadn’t checked yet. 

“Let’s see,” he said.

He grabbed the phone, and his eyes widened. He uttered an expletive.

“Two-hundred and five,” he said.

That support shouldn’t come as a surprise. Sullivan is beloved in the Padres clubhouse, and he has made an awful lot of stops along his journey. A 17th-round pick in the 2015 Draft, Sullivan spent six seasons in the Rays system before signing with the Brewers in '21. Shortly thereafter, he was dealt to the Padres in the trade that sent Victor Caratini to Milwaukee.

Drafted as an infielder, Sullivan made the transition to catcher in 2016. It was during the ‘19 season, when the Rays experimented with him as an outfielder, that Sullivan acknowledged losing some belief that a day like this might ever happen.

“Those thoughts of what you went through -- you definitely have some times back then where you wonder if it ever will happen,” Sullivan said. “That makes it that much better. To be able to get the win on top of it, it means a lot.”