Padres turn Truist Park into a Home Run Derby

For a while it looked like a pitchers' duel. Then the Padres remembered they have three of the scariest right-handed bats in baseball in the same lineup, and Atlanta's pitching staff spent the rest of the night picking baseballs out of the second deck.

Jackson Merrill got it going first, tying the game at 2-2 with a solo shot off Braves starter Reynaldo Lopez. The Statcast readout on the broadcast had it at 99 mph off the bat and traveling 405 feet, the kind of number that tells you this wasn't a cheap one.

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@StoolBaseball

Home Run Jackson Merrill!

Once Merrill broke the seal, Manny Machado turned the game into a personal batting practice session. He went deep twice, the second one his 22nd of the season, and by the sixth inning San Diego had built a 6-2 cushion. He's not just hot, he's carrying the middle of this lineup right now.

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@StoolBaseball

Man oh Manny this man is hot

The night's signature moment came in the top of the 8th, with the Padres already up 8-3. Fernando Tatis Jr. got hold of one and sent it 474 feet, the longest home run in the majors this season, according to reporting on the game. It's a wild swing in narrative for a guy who not so long ago was getting picked apart for a stretch where the power just wasn't showing up.

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@StoolBaseball

474 FEET FERNANDO TATIS JR

That kind of talk about Tatis lacking pop always felt premature given his track record, and nights like this are exactly why. When a lineup can survive a slow start from its most talented player and still have him erupt for a moonshot that outdoes a Braves catcher's own long ball from earlier this year, that's a problem for the rest of the National League.

San Diego closed it out 8-3, piling up 4 homers total between Merrill, Machado's pair, and Tatis' bomb. For a Padres team that's leaned on pitching and defense for stretches this year, a night where the lineup does all the damage on its own is exactly the kind of result they'll want to point to heading into the stretch run.