“Honestly it means the world to me because all my friends, we like the Padres. We try to come whenever we can,” Padres fan Nick Meraz told KPBS Wednesday.
The high schooler from Chula Vista is excited for the postseason, and with good reason: the San Diego Padres are going to the playoffs.
“When we heard that they clinched and all that, in school we started to [yell for joy]. It was awesome,” Meraz said.
People of all ages and places are coming together to celebrate the team.
Alycia Reyes flew in from Sacramento to watch the Padres’ final regular season game on Wednesday with her aunt.
“I actually think that they're the heartbeat of San Diego right now,” Reyes said about the Major League Baseball team. “We just got to get into that and hold on to them so that they don't go anywhere.”
San Diego has had pro teams go elsewhere before, losing the Chargers to Los Angeles in 2017. Before that, in 1984, the Clippers made the move to L.A.
The Padres are locked in to the number five seed in the National League. That means they’ll play a best-of-three wild card series against the number four seeded New York Mets.
The last time the Padres made the playoffs was in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season where they were knocked out by the eventual World Series Champion Los Angeles Dodgers.
13-year-old Joaquin Morales was celebrating his birthday at the ballpark Wednesday, and said things feel different this time around.
“I think we’ve got a pretty good chance of making it to the World Series,” he said.
The team has overcome adversity, like losing star player Fernando Tatís Jr. all season — first due to injuries and later, a failed drug test.
They also added big names to the roster in the middle of the season.
“My favorite player right now has to be Juan Soto and I think the Padres are really good as a family,” Morales said.
Before 2020, the Padres hadn't been to the playoffs since winning their division in 2006.
This season marks the team’s seventh playoff berth in franchise history and the fourth since Petco Park opened in 2004.
“It’s been really up and down for them — it's been hard,” Drew Hattendorf said.
He and his little brother Chase hope this year’s best moments are yet to come.
“I think they're going to do pretty well because they've got their starting pitching on a roll and now they've also got their bats heating up,” the older brother said.
The wild-card series begins Friday at 5 p.m. PST. The Padres will travel to New York to play their best-of-three matchup with the Mets.
If they can win two games in that series, they’ll face the Los Angeles Dodgers in the best-of-five National League Division Series starting Oct. 11.
