The last time the San Diego Padres won the National League pennant and played in the World Series was 1998. I was eleven years old, very excited to watch them play on baseball’s biggest stage, and very disappointed to see them get steamrolled by the Yankees (who were steamrolling everybody in those days). I don’t know how I would have handled it if somebody told me that I’d be in my 40’s before they got another chance.
Over time my attention has waxed and waned, but it’s been pretty consistent the last few years, as Ariele has joined me in baseball fandom and San Diego has played well. They’ve reached the playoffs more often than not since we started watching games together, which means nearly every October we’ve been able to ask “could this be the year?”
And so far, no, it hasn’t been the year. I swear, watching the Padres in the postseason is enough to make you believe in curses. At some point, the wind falls out of their sails and they crash into the reef of inevitability. This year, they had the best record in baseball for the month of September, and they felt unstoppable until they met the Milwaukee Brewers, who incidentally had the best record overall. The Padres played heroically and tenaciously, usually scoring first and never allowing the Brewers to lead by more than two runs, but they lost the division series three games to one. Chalk it up to bad luck—a few home runs that weren’t quite home runs, an otherwise formidable bullpen that picked the wrong week to start blowing saves.
Now the Brewers, who really have been an amazing team this year, have easily dispatched the Dodgers for the pennant and will play in the World Series. As it happens the Padres and Brewers are basically tied for the distinction of being the oldest MLB team to have never won a championship. I wish the Brewers well (for reasons I’ve spelled out before), but a part of me seethes to think that Milwaukee will likely make history before San Diego does. If they ever do make it back to the World Series I probably won’t care anymore, but for now I’m definitely seething.
Every offseason I fret that some catastrophic change in the roster will ruin the Padres and cast them back into the woods for a generation, but baseball fandom is no fun if you’re eternally pessimistic. That’s why I say that I don’t know how long it will take, but the Padres will make it back someday. They will burst through whatever cruel barrier separates them from championships, and after that it won’t matter if it takes them another couple of decades to do it again, because they’ll always have that one. But maybe a little dynasty of our own wouldn’t be too much to ask for, either…
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