This was not the sort of lineup tweak the Padres could afford to get wrong. With Game 2 of the NL Wild Card Series hanging over them and an 0-2 hole looming, they made a late switch that pushed Ethan Salas out of the designated hitter spot and dropped Gavin Sheets into the role less than an hour before the 1 p.m. first pitch. That meant Church For Parents would have to wait, and it also meant the Padres were betting on a hitter who has quietly earned more trust than he had a few weeks ago.
Salas had already made history on Wednesday by becoming the youngest catcher in postseason history, and he had stayed involved with a single off Jacob Misiorowski on Saturday. But Sunday brought a different call. Sheets, recently back from a month-long absence caused by a plantar plate tear in his left foot, was the one moved into the lineup at DH for his first postseason start. In a game where every at-bat matters, that is not a trivial change. It is a statement about who the Padres trust to hit right now.
Why Sheets got the nod
Craig Stammen made the case in plain terms: Sheets has been impressive since arriving, battled through a rough start without a hit, then settled in and turned hot. Stammen pointed to the couple of strong at-bats on Saturday and said Sheets had earned the chance to keep hitting. That is the kind of logic postseason lineups are built on. Momentum, timing and trust matter just as much as reputation.
Jake Cronenworth backed that up from the clubhouse side, saying the room has experience and that the Padres have been playing well. That matters too. The Padres are not making this move in a vacuum. They are trying to avoid becoming the latest team to cough up a series with a flat second game, and they entered Sunday needing to guard against the kind of 0-2 deficit that changes the entire mood of a playoff run.
A small change with real consequences
It is easy to shrug at a last-minute DH switch, but that would miss the point. Salas had been on track to become the youngest DH in postseason history, and instead the Padres chose the more established bat. That says something about how tightly they are managing this series and how much weight they are giving current form.
The setting only sharpened it. The last time the Padres lost back-to-back games was Sept. 1-2 in Cincinnati, and they were walking into a postseason game at American Family Field with the temperature sitting at 67-degree. In that kind of environment, the margin for error shrinks quickly. Gavin Sheets in the DH spot is not a dramatic headline in the way a pitching change would be, but it is a real one: the Padres wanted a better immediate chance to hit, and they made the call before first pitch rather than after the damage was done.
That is the story here. Not a mystery, not a scandal, just a club making a blunt playoff decision. Salas’ history-making week will still matter. But on Sunday, the Padres chose the hotter bat, the healthier body and the cleaner short-term gamble. If they are going to rescue Game 2, it is Gavin Sheets who now has the chance to help them do it.
