Padres fans are more excited than ever to hit the ground running this season. NBC 7’s Dana Williams was downtown to catch all the fan action on Opening Day.
On the first day of the Major League Baseball season, the Padres and Braves played a tight, taught contest that ping ponged back and forth all day long at Petco Park.
The San Diego Padres took control of the game with a 4-run 7th inning, turning a 4-3 deficit into a 7-4 win against the Atlanta Braves.
Michael King, coming off a season in which he won 13 games and struck out a career high 201 batters, made his first career Opening Day start.
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The first batter King faced was former Padre and current Braves lead-off hitter Jurickson Profar, who led off the season with a single to right field. After the Braves loaded the bases with 2 walks, Atlanta took a 1-0 lead on an Ozzie Albies force out.
The Padres, who ended last season with 24 consecutive scoreless innings against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the playoffs, started this season on a positive, as Fernando Tatis Junior lined a lead-off single to right field. 4 batters later Jackson Merrill lined a ball to center scoring Tatis and Manny Machado for a 2-1 lead and ended a long scoreless streak that dated back to last season.
In the 3rd inning, with one on and two out, Ozzie Albies jumped on a King offering for a go-ahead 2-run homer.
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After that King allowed a hit and a walk and didn't make it out of the inning. His final pitching line 2.2 innings, 3 runs, 4 hits, 4 base on balls and 3 strikeouts.
The Padres evened the game at 3 on a Jackson Merrill ground out in the bottom of the 3rd.
The game see-sawed back the Braves way in the 4th, when Austin Riley took Alek Jacob over the wall in left center for 4-3 Atlanta lead.
It stayed tied until the bottom of the 7th, when Gavin Sheets came off the bench and launched a solo homer over the wall in center field. The 405 foot homer was Sheets first hit and first home run with the Padres.
Holy Sheets 🤯 pic.twitter.com/qoC5S3CbZp
— San Diego Padres (@Padres) March 27, 2025
Later in the inning, after back to back singles by Elias Diaz and Tatis, Luis Arraez drove in pinch runner Jason Heyward with the go-ahead run.
Manny Machado padded the Padres lead with an RBI double scoring Tatis to make it 6-4. San Diego added another as Machado scored on a Merrill sac fly.
The Padres and Braves continue their 4-game series Friday at Petco Park with a 6:40pm start, as starting pitcher Dylan Cease is scheduled to make his 2025 season debut.
