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By Rowan Kavner
FOX Sports MLB Writer
SAN DIEGO — No one wanted to leave.
After the final strikeout Friday, rally towels continued twirling through a sea of brown and gold. The lights at Petco Park flickered on and off. A city buzzed, and a party 16 years in the making continued long after Josh Hader set the Dodgers down in order in the ninth inning of Game 3 to move the underdog Padres one win away from advancing to the National League Championship Series.
“It was electric,” catcher Austin Nola said after the 2-1 win. “I just kept looking up there at times, wanting to take this all in.”
San Diego fans hadn’t witnessed a home playoff game in person since 2006, back when Dave Roberts was the starting left fielder. Now, he’s the opposing manager of a 111-win team that finds itself on the brink of elimination, to this point unable to solve a Padres bullpen that has yet to surrender a run through three games.
Before the series, the focus centered on the Dodgers’ bullpen. Who would close games after Craig Kimbrel’s demotion? Could their league-leading group of relievers continue their success through the postseason? There wasn’t much talk of a San Diego bullpen that has since made itself impossible to ignore.
Padres relievers have combined for 13 scoreless innings, playing a primary reason in the Dodgers’ 0-for-17 mark with runners in scoring position during losses in Games 2 and 3. On Friday, the San Diego bullpen struck out six batters and allowed one hit in 3⅔ scoreless innings.
“We’re a bunch of dogs, man,” reliever Nick Martinez said. “We’ve all scuffled. Everyone’s been through a journey that wasn’t easy. We’re a bunch of survivors in here.”
The Padres acquired Hader at the deadline to thrive in these situations, and he has saved his best baseball of the season for the right time. But the bullpen’s success has gone far beyond the hard-throwing lefty, who was one of three Padres relievers to fire a pitch with triple-digit velocity Friday.
Luis Garcia, a 35-year-old with a career 4.05 ERA pitching for his fifth big-league team, recorded two strikeouts in a scoreless inning while reaching back for 101 mph heat. Robert Suarez, whose professional journey took him from Venezuela to Mexico to Japan before he made his major-league debut at 31 years old this season, followed his two scoreless innings in Game 2 with another scoreless inning Friday.
And there was Martinez, whose most recent major-league inning before this season came with the Rangers in 2017, making his third straight scoreless appearance of this NLDS. He spent the previous four years pitching professionally in Japan.
“I think anytime you hold a lineup like that down like we have here, that’s hard to do,” Padres manager Bob Melvin said. “But we feel like it’s a really deep bullpen, a lot of power arms pitching well toward the end of the season, into the postseason, inspired even a little bit more so.”
There are times when Martinez considers the journey.
The thoughts don’t cross his mind while he’s pitching, but they enter when he’s at home chatting with his wife. The two consider, at times, how far they’ve come.
“At the end of that talk, it’s usually to stay hungry, to stay on top of it, don’t forget those struggles but keep that mentality,” he said.
Five years ago, Martinez was 3-8 with a 5.66 ERA pitching for the Rangers. He then signed with the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters in free agency. Now, he’s pitching in key moments of a major-league playoff game.
On Friday, he entered in the sixth inning for starter Blake Snell, who departed after allowing a double to Max Muncy with one out and a one-run lead. Martinez struck out Justin Turner and got a groundout from Chris Taylor to escape the threat, adding to the Dodgers’ growing concerns when they get a chance to strike.
“I always believed in myself,” he said. “There might’ve been times that I was down, but I’ve always believed in myself and had the support of my friends and family to keep going.”
In Game 3, he also had the support of a raucous crowd.
Before Snell threw his first pitch in the 2-1 win, a video played of Dodgers starter Tony Gonsolin saying he couldn’t imagine the atmosphere at Petco Park being any louder than 50,000 fans at Dodger Stadium. For the next four hours, 45,137 fans in attendance tried to challenge that claim.
A cacophony of “Beat L.A.” chants filled the stadium. The Padres restricted playoff ticket sales to the local area and counties, and barely a smattering of blue dotted the stands. Melvin thought his relievers fed off the relentless noise.
“You don’t see 100 mph often, especially out of three guys in a row,” he said. “So I’m sure it had a big say.”
In San Diego’s Game 1 loss, the bullpen spun 5⅓ scoreless innings to give the Padres a chance. In a Game 2 win, they outlasted the Dodgers’ relievers with four scoreless frames.
On Friday, sparked by a crowd waiting to ignite, their 3⅔ scoreless innings put the Padres one win away from shocking the world and slaying the “dragon up the freeway,” as Padres owner Peter Seidler dubbed the Dodgers two months ago.
“Whatever the situation is, whoever it is … we’re going to bring it,” Martinez said.
Rowan Kavner covers the Dodgers and NL West for FOX Sports. He previously was the Dodgers’ editor of digital and print publications. Follow him on Twitter at @RowanKavner.
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