Padres Walk-Off vs Reds: Tatis' 10th-Inning Sac Fly Seals Opener

Padres walk off Reds in 10 innings

Down 3-0 and stuck in neutral, the Padres looked like they might let the series opener slip away. Instead, they clawed back, forced extras, and handed their crowd the good kind of whiplash. Fernando Tatis Jr. lifted a sacrifice fly to left in the bottom of the 10th to beat the Cincinnati Reds, 4-3, on a cool September night at Petco Park. It wasn’t a tape-measure shot. It didn’t need to be. It was smart, situational hitting in a moment that demanded it.

The Reds owned the early innings. They punched first, built a 3-0 cushion, and put the onus on San Diego to solve it. That kind of start on the road can break a game open. Instead, the Padres did what good September teams do: shorten swings, push traffic, and take the runs that are available. One here, one there—then the tie. By the time the game reached the late innings, the energy in the ballpark had flipped.

Extra innings bring baseball’s oddest chess match. With the automatic runner at second, every out is amplified, and every ground ball or fly ball has a job. The Reds failed to cash their chance in the top half. The bottom half was a clinic in moving a runner, setting up a chance, and trusting your best hitters to lift the ball. Tatis stepped in against right-hander Martinez and got the kind of pitch a hitter can work with—a 92.7 mph sinker with 2,150 rpm of spin. He stayed inside it, sent it at a 30-degree launch angle, and the ball carried 309 feet to left. Deep enough, loud enough, and game over.

There’s beauty in a sacrifice fly people don’t always see. It’s the product of understanding counts, speed on the bases, and where the outfield is playing. In the bottom of an extra inning, defenders can’t camp out on the warning track; they need to guard against singles. A well-struck fly into the alley or toward the line forces a long throw. That’s the calculation Tatis won, even without max exit velocity. You could feel it in the crowd as the ball left his bat—heads turning to third, a breath held, then a release as the runner crossed.

Cincinnati will be sick about the missed chance to stretch the lead once they had it. They got early production, quieted the building, and had San Diego’s order in tough counts. But the game slowed in the middle frames, and the Reds’ bats didn’t land the knockout blow. Their bullpen, asked to hold a slim lead across multiple innings, had to thread a needle. One mistake in extra innings is often one too many.

For San Diego, the path to the win was as much about temperament as it was about tactics. They didn’t chase the big inning. They trimmed the deficit, kept their relievers fresh enough to bridge the middle, and lined up the hitters they wanted in the key spots. That’s how you steal a game that starts 3-0 the wrong way. It takes clean defense, steady relief work, and just enough timely contact to make the banked outs count.

The pitch that Tatis handled tells its own story. A sinker at that speed and spin wants ground balls. It’s built to saw off barrels or nudge hitters into topping something to the middle infield. Tatis went against the pitch’s intent. He got under it just enough to lift, not yank; to the pull side, not straightaway; and to a depth that forces the left fielder’s momentum away from the plate. If you’re Cincinnati, that’s the exact batted-ball profile you’re trying to avoid in that spot.

Petco Park plays fair-to-big, especially at night. A 309-foot fly to left is not flirting with the fence here. It’s a carry job that challenges the fielder but favors the runner—long route, off-balance throw, and very little margin for an on-target strike at the plate. With the winning run taking off on contact, the math tilted heavily to the offense the moment the ball reached medium-deep territory.

The vibe mattered, too. Petco is different when a rally builds; the noise rolls in from the lower bowl and lingers behind the visitor’s dugout. Once the game reset at 3-3, every two-strike clap felt heavier. You could see San Diego’s hitters lengthen at-bats and force Cincinnati’s pitchers into the zone. Walks, foul balls, and opposite-field contact don’t trend on highlights, but they swing leverage. By extra innings, the Padres had it.

There’s a strategic lesson tucked inside the final frame. In the bottom of the 10th, teams don’t have to outslug anyone. They have to out-execute. Move the free runner, avoid the strikeout, put a ball in the air with fewer than two outs. San Diego checked those boxes. Cincinnati didn’t in the top half, and that’s the tightrope this rule creates—one productive out is the difference between handshakes and heading back onto the field.

Zoom out a bit and the result fits the moment on the calendar. September games turn into mini stress tests. How quickly can you reset after a bad inning? Can your bench give you a clean bunt or a sharp pinch-hit grounder to the right side? Do your late-inning arms throw strikes when the infield has to be on its toes? San Diego answered more of those questions on night one of this series. Cincinnati now has to answer them back.

The Tatis factor will hover over the rest of the set. He doesn’t need a four-hit night to shape a series; one at-bat with the game in the balance does the job. Pitchers start to feel that, and it affects how they attack the hitters in front of him and behind him. Mix in his arm in right field and his speed on the bases, and he shifts the geometry of a game even when the box score looks modest.

For the Reds, the encouraging piece is the start. Their formula worked early: pressure on the bases, competitive at-bats, soft contact turned into runs. The fix is to extend that approach beyond the fifth inning. In the middle and late frames, they’ll want more traffic for the top of the order and a little more patience to get into San Diego’s secondary relievers. The moments were there; they just didn’t cash them.

As a series tone-setter, this is about as crisp as it gets for San Diego. Win the opener. Tax the opponent’s bullpen. Make them throw stressful innings and sprint out of the dugout on a short turnaround the next day. In September, that’s often how a series breaks—one club gets to managerial Plan B by Wednesday, and the other stays on script.

Both teams know what’s at stake down the stretch. The Reds are fighting to stack wins in a tight divisional picture. The Padres are trying to convert home games into separation and keep their late-inning machine humming. Night one goes to San Diego on a ball that didn’t need a wall, just a runway and a clean tag at the plate. That’s the kind of win a clubhouse remembers when it counts again tomorrow.

What the win says about San Diego—and the series ahead

- San Diego handled the early punch. Falling behind 3-0 can tilt a lineup into chase mode; they resisted and strung together scoring innings.

- The late-inning plan held. Multiple relievers kept the ball on the ground, erased mistakes with defense, and gave the offense room to breathe.

- Execution beat power at the finish. A sacrifice fly in the right spot is worth more than a loud out. Tatis read the situation and lifted what the defense couldn’t stop.

- Cincinnati’s path back is clear. They need more length from their middle innings and a cleaner conversion rate with runners in scoring position after the fifth. The opener showed they can set the table; now it’s about finishing the plate.

The series continues with both clubs leaning on what worked. For San Diego, that’s traffic, tempo, and clean out-getting. For Cincinnati, it’s early strikes, controlled aggression on the bases, and finding the one swing in the seventh or eighth that changes everything. Monday set the scene. The rest of the week decides who owns it.