After 41 seasons calling Padres games on radio, beloved broadcaster Ted Leitner stepped away from the booth earlier this year, as he transitions into a team ambassador role.

MLB.com caught up with Leitner and reflected on a handful of his favorite games and calls from his tenure in San Diego. Here they are, in chronological order:

Sept. 29, 1996: Padres win NL West
It had been a dozen years since the Padres' most recent postseason appearance when they rolled into Dodger Stadium in September 1996. They'd already wrapped up a playoff berth but needed to sweep Los Angeles for the National League West title. Leitner set the scene:

"Three out with three to play, and you've got to win three to win the division," he said. "I just thought the Dodgers poo-pooed the entire thing, the entire weekend. 'Hey, what do we care? We'll take the Wild Card.' I thought that was really a stupid thing to say in competition."

Sure enough, the Padres swept the Dodgers. Tony Gwynn's two-run eighth-inning single proved decisive in Game 2, and Chris Gwynn's 11th-inning double won Game 3. Trevor Hoffman saved all three games.

"The Padres played it like they were playing for their life," Leitner recalled. "Tony Gwynn, Chris Gwynn had those big hits, and I thought Trevor coming out and saving all three games, the strikeout of Chad Curtis to wrap it up, I thought it was a big, big moment for Padres baseball."

Sept. 29, 1998: Brown outduels Johnson
Pitching duels in October don't always live up to their billing. This one did. In a raucous Astrodome, Kevin Brown outdueled Randy Johnson in Game 1 of the NL Division Series against Houston, setting a DS record with 16 strikeouts.

"Sixteen strikeouts by Brownie," Leitner quipped. "That's a helluva game to have fun as a broadcaster."

The Padres won, 2-1, thanks to a sac fly by Jim Leyritz and a homer by Greg Vaughn. In Leitner's estimation, that game probably ranks at the top of the most thrilling games he's ever called.

Oct. 14, 1998: Hitchcock's unlikely heroics
Leitner's favorite singular moment -- and he says probably his favorite singular call -- isn't what you'd expect. It was Game 6 of the 1998 NL Championship Series, and the Padres were clinging to a two-run lead over Atlanta. On the precipice of their first World Series in 14 years, starting pitcher Sterling Hitchcock came to the plate with two outs and the bases loaded in the sixth.

"Hitchcock of all people," Leitner recalled. "I mean, he was so terrific that postseason, but obviously wasn't known as a hitter."

The veteran left-hander lofted a bloop to left field. Danny Bautista stumbled and couldn't make the play as the ball caromed off his glove. Two runs scored, and the celebration began. Leitner's play-by-play perfectly captures those emotions.

Leitner starts hopefully -- "swing and a bloop into left field, coming on, coming on" -- then he erupts.

"Off the glove of Bautista! One run scores! Here comes Finley! The Padres have broken it open here in Game 6 in Atlanta!"

It's a moment often forgotten in Padres lore (the play was ruled an error, so no hit or RBIs for Hitchcock). But because of the significance, it will always stand out to Leitner.

"That was it, it was over," Leitner said. "We knew it was time to call that 767 charter, with all the families and the front-office people. Time to set a flight plan to New York."

Oct. 17, 1998: Gwynn's World Series homer
If there's a defining call from Leitner's career, it's undoubtedly Tony Gwynn's go-ahead home run in Game 1 of the 1998 World Series amid a stunned Yankee Stadium.

Leitner's call is succinct, perfectly cadenced and descriptive, and it appropriately embraces the gravity of the moment for a Padres legend.

"High, deep right field, toward the right-field foul pole, if that's fair it's gone, and it is going and gone. Home run, Anthony Keith Gwynn, 4-2 Padres."

Ever the perfectionist, Leitner says he has one small regret when he watches the replay.

"I say, 'If that's fair it's gone,' and having looked at the videotape, it wasn't that close," he quips.

Still, it's an indelible moment in Gwynn's career -- his only World Series home run, coming in a tie game at Yankee Stadium. That moment will forever be linked with Leitner.

"Yankee Stadium, knowing him, and knowing what it meant to be back in the World Series ... I just thought, 'Who wrote this script?'" Leitner said. "It was wonderful. Then, the only thing that could've been better was to keep that lead and win Game 1. Unfortunately, that didn't happen."

Sept. 24, 2006: Hoffman's record-setting save
Leitner made a habit of calling milestones for legendary closer Trevor Hoffman. One of those milestones stands out. When Hoffman passed Lee Smith for the all-time saves record, Petco Park erupts, and the Padres storm out of the dugout to mob Hoffman.

Hoffman himself merely smiles and pumps his fist as he's swarmed by teammates.

"And the ultimate team player, has just set the ultimate individual relief record in baseball history. How 'bout that? Four hundred seventy-nine saves for the great Trevor Hoffman of the San Diego Padres."

In retrospect, Leitner is particularly proud of that call because he feels it does justice to one of the great teammates of all-time.

"I thought that fit him," Leitner said. "I never wrote those things beforehand, I know some broadcasters do -- plan it, work it, all that stuff. But I just thought: That's him. Whoever was more team, team, team than he was?"

Oct. 1, 2007: Game 163 thriller
Leitner is just as irked by the ending as any other Padres fan. He maintains, to this day, that Matt Holliday did not touch home plate in the bottom of the 13th inning at Coors Field.

Still, a great baseball game is a great baseball game, and Leitner does his best to appreciate the classic winner-take-all one-game playoff between the Rockies and Padres in 2007. Colorado jumps out to an early lead, before Adrián González puts the Padres on top with a third-inning grand slam. The game carries into extras, and the Padres finally break through for two in the 13th before surrendering three in the bottom half.

"Game 163 was just huge," Leitner said. "I always say, if that thing was Cardinals and Cubs or Red Sox and Yankees, they'd put that thing on ESPN Classic every other day. That was one of the classic baseball games of all time. The ebb and flow was unbelievable, Adrián's grand slam. They just didn't get it done -- you know the play at home plate call with Holliday. But as far as the individual game that I remember, that would be No. 1 with any of them."

Oct. 2, 2020: A surreal comeback
The Padres' come-from-behind Wild Card Series victory over the Cardinals holds a bittersweet place in Leitner's heart. The three games were thrilling, culminating with a 4-0 Padres victory in the rubber match. But after 14 years without postseason baseball, Leitner says he couldn't stop envisioning what a packed Petco Park would've looked like in the moment.

Alas, in a season played amid the COVID-19 pandemic, it wasn't to be. But Leitner could still appreciate the scenes surrounding Petco Park in the immediate aftermath. Car horns blared, and fans clanged on pots and pans from their balconies -- a cacophony of noise that lasted more than an hour after the final out.

"I've never seen anything like that, with the horns honking, people sticking Padre flags out their windows," Leitner recalled. "It was like after a football game in a college town -- a big college football win. It brought a smile to my face. It was amazing, just amazing. We didn't have the fans [in the ballpark], but that celebration downtown was wonderful. ... It was just incredible, I had people coming up to me by the dozens in celebration. 'Hi Ted!' and 'Thank you, Ted.'

"I'll just never, ever forget it. As it turned out, it was my last broadcast at Petco Park. It's something I'll always cherish."