Jackson Merrill tried to lay down a bunt in the second inning of the Padres’ 5-0 loss to the Mets, and it did not work. In a game that already felt thin on offense, the attempt became another empty turn at a time when San Diego badly needed one clean inning to change the mood.
Merrill did not run from the play afterward. He said he faulted himself for it, but also said he had been swinging a pretty good bat for the last week and did not blame himself for trying to help the team. His view was simple: know the situation, and try to do something that gets the club moving. “We need something to get going,” he said. “We need somebody to drive the ball in the gap, get it going.”
That search for a jolt is why the bunt mattered. The Padres have successfully laid down just five sacrifice bunts all season, after leading MLB with 48 last season. For a lineup that has spent too many innings producing empty outs and leaving runners stranded, the failed bunt was part of a broader picture of an offense that has been stuck for stretches and is still looking for any practical way out.
There was some early life in another inning when Fernando Tatis Jr. opened with a leadoff single, but Gavin Sheets followed with a fly ball to left field and Manny Machado grounded into an inning-ending double play. That sequence did not last long enough to change the game, and it also showed why the bunt attempt drew so much attention: San Diego is chasing a spark, but the choices it makes in those moments can look smart in the dugout and questionable once they miss.
Manager Craig Stammen said the players had banded together, trying any way possible to get the offense going and keep the group tight through the slump. He said sometimes those efforts work and sometimes they do not, and he added that he wants his players to play baseball rather than press for numbers. The Padres can keep reaching for small-ball answers, but unless the bats start producing something louder than a bunt try, the next turn at the plate may end the same way this one did.
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