Padres Wild Card odds: Breaking down how San Diego can make a run at a playoff spot

It’s been a frustrating August for the San Diego Padres so far, punctuated by a 3-1 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks on Thursday night that dropped their record for the month to 6-9 — including a disappointing 4-9 mark over a 13-game stretch against fellow contenders in the Dodgers, Mariners, D-backs and Orioles. It was a golden opportunity for San Diego to make some hay in a very crowded NL Wild Card race, but with six weeks to go in the regular season, Bob Melvin’s crew still finds themselves looking up a playoff spot.

Still, the season-long refrain bears repeating: This team, on paper at least, has as much talent as anyone. Yes, the Braves are a menace, but Fernando Tatis Jr., Juan Soto and Manny Machado have the potential to wreck shop over a short series — if they can manage to make it to October. So, what will that postseason push require? How likely is it that the Padres turn things around? Let’s break down where the standings sit and what the road ahead looks like.

Padres 2023 NL Wild Card odds

Granted, San Diego isn’t playing very good baseball right now. The rotation is still in flux, with Joe Musgrove potentially out for the year with a shoulder injury, Michael Wacha still rusty after a lengthy IL stint and Yu Darvish maddeningly inconsistent. The lineup disappears far too often for a group that features Tatis, Soto, Machado and Xander Bogaerts. The bullpen still hasn’t settled on a way to get leads to Josh Hader in the ninth. We’ve been waiting all year for this team to get into gear, and more than four months on, we’re still waiting.

There are a couple of silver linings here, though. First: A bunch of the other teams in the NL Wild Card race right now aren’t playing as though they actually want to be in the NL Wild Card race. The Giants, Reds, Marlins and D-backs have all been slumping in the second half, with glaring flaws on their rosters that don’t show any signs of fixing themselves. If the Padres can be even halfway decent down the stretch, there’s a very good chance that they’ll be the last team standing.

Which brings us to the other thing working in San Diego’s favor: their schedule. The Padres are currently slated to face a bottom-third schedule from here on out, with a combined opponents’ winning percentage of .497. Among their fellow Wild Card contenders, only San Fran has an easier road home, and marginally at that. Arizona (.505), Miami (.504) and Cincinnati (.500), meanwhile, have their work cut out for them. San Diego’s September features series against the Rockies, White Sox, Athletics and Cardinals, and the more challenging matchups come against the teams they’ll be directly jockeying with for a playoff spot (three against the Marlins, Brewers and Phillies, seven against the Giants).

Again, San Diego is hardly lacking in talent. Despite their current hole, they have everything in front of them if they can find a way to piece together consistent play.