Last Night in Baseball: Padres Down Rockies With Extra-Inning Walk-Off Grand Slam

There is always baseball happening — almost too much baseball for one person to follow themselves. Don’t worry, we’re here to help you by figuring out what you missed but shouldn’t have. Here are all the best moments from last night in Major League Baseball: Padres walk it off in extras with a grand slam Sure, the subhed tells you the result, at least in vague terms, but it’s the details that truly make this an early classic of the 2026 season. There wasn’t all that much scoring early on in this Padres-Rockies tilt: Colorado center fielder Brenton Doyle hit a solo shot in the third inning off of San Diego starter Randy Vasquez, then Padres’ right fielder Fernando Tatis Jr. answered back in the bottom of the frame with a sac fly. Neither team would score again through the first nine innings — San Diego closer Mason Miller made extra sure of that in the ninth, when he struck out the side to give the Padres one last chance at avoiding extras. Filthy. Once Miller was out of the game, though, Colorado’s bats woke back up. Right fielder Tyler Freeman, who had entered the game in the eighth as a pinch-hitter, singled in Willi Castro to put the Rockies ahead for the second time in the game. The Padres would once again answer in the same inning, however, as they did in the third, and yet again on a sac fly, this time from the bat of third baseman Manny Machado. That’s all San Diego could muster, though, as shortstop Xander Bogaerts grounded out with two runners in scoring position, forcing the game to the 11th… where the Rockies once again scored. Third baseman Kyle Karros began the inning at second base, and catcher Brett Sullivan immediately doubled him home. The Rockies sent lefty Brennan Bernardino to the mound in the bottom of the 11th, with Bogaerts starting out at second. First baseman Gavin Sheets singled him to third, but then DH Nick Castellanos lined out and pinch-hitter Ramon Laureano struck out, leaving the Padres with the game-tying run at third and their final out. Catcher Luis Campusano, who entered the game earlier after starting backstop Freddy Fermin was lifted for a pinch-hitter, would hit a double to drive in Bogaerts and tie the game in San Diego’s final chance. Second baseman Jake Cronenworth would pop out to end the threat, giving the Rockies another shot — for the first time since the ninth, though, San Diego kept Colorado’s hitters in check, leaving the game tied in the bottom of the 12th. There, the Rockies replaced Bernardino with Valento Bellozo, and leadoff batter Tatis bunted Cronenworth to third. Then, Bellozo intentionally walked center fielder Jackson Merrill and Manny Machado to face Bogaerts, who isn’t the hitter he used to be but, even more importantly, isn’t Merrill nor Machado, either. The result? A walk-off grand slam, the ultimate form of the revenge dinger following an intentional walk. Now, it’s tough to blame the Rockies for this, since they were attempting to both create a force at any base in a situation where the winning run was already at third, and two of the Padres’ best hitters were coming to the plate with one out. Bogaerts isn’t a pushover, but he’s not an up-and-coming star nor a future Hall of Famer who still hits like that’s the case. He can still get a hold of one, though, and he sure did here to win the game. The Rockies were denied a chance at getting over .500 for the first time since the 2022 season, while the Padres pushed over that mark after a tough first week with a 1-4 start. It’s early for both teams, of course, but: what a game. Nailed it This isn’t a bunt, no, but spiritually? It is nothing but a bunt. And it’s a beautiful (not) bunt at that. Royals’ star shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. hit the pin on the green with this one. The Royals might not have won against the White Sox — Kansas City fell to Chicago, 2-0 — but Witt, at least, managed to involve himself in a couple of notable plays. This one with his bat, and then another with his glove. What a play! And oh, what a play with his glove it was. Check this grounder right up the middle from White Sox first baseman Munetaka Murakami, and the hop it takes right before it gets to Witt. He handles it no problem — his quick adjustment here would be a highlight on its own — but the play doesn’t end there. Witt takes the ball himself to second from the deep infield, then manages to get a throw to first on the run, where first baseman Vinny Pasquantino makes quite the pick himself to get the double play. Whew. Scoring from first is exhausting Murakami gets the double-highlight treatment, too, as, for the first run of the game — which also ended up being the winning one in the end — he ran all the way from first to third on this double off the bat of shortstop Colson Montgomery. What’s impressive here is that Murakami didn’t really get going until he rounded second, since at first he was hanging back to see if it was even safe to advance. Once he got going, though, he didn’t stop, and slid headfirst into home well ahead of any possible play. Things were a little tougher on the first-to-home front for Diamondbacks’ center fielder Alek Thomas, when right fielder Jorge Barrosa hit what would end up being a triple in the seventh inning against the Mets and reliever Luke Weaker. There are two outs, so Thomas is off at the crack of the bat, but he is digging to make this run happen. The steps don’t look like they are coming easy nor fast, but Thomas keeps at it, and beats the throw home by a mile despite not looking like he’s flying around the bases. Mets needed more McLean, less everyone else This will work well enough as a segue. But first, a flashback! Mets’ starter Nolan McLean was dealing against Arizona, with the righty rolling for six innings, maintaining New York’s 1-0 lead with seven strikeouts against a pair of walks and just two hits. McLean entered the seventh at 85 pitches, so he had been fairly efficient to that point, but he gave that all away against the first few Diamondbacks batters here. Shortstop Geraldo Perdomo walked to lead off the frame (six pitches), and while McLean then struck out DH Adrian Del Castillo (four), rookie third baseman Jose Fernandez would single Perdomo into scoring position (five). At 100 pitches and with two runners on, McLean was lifted for Luke Weaver. Things immediately went south, as pinch-hitter Gabriel Moreno doubled in Perdomo, and then Alek Thomas reached on a fielder’s choice that scored Fernandez when the tag at the plate didn’t connect. Moreno then scored on a sac fly to put Arizona up 3-1, and the triple that drove in Thomas happened next, giving the Diamondbacks a four-run inning. Arizona would tack on another three runs in the eighth, with Moreno doubling in the seventh and final run of the day. McLean was charged with two runs, but that’s also on Weaver for not doing his job and getting two outs without giving up his inherited runners — he allowed those and two more besides to score. Luis Garcia didn’t do much better in the eighth, and the game was just out of reach for New York. Of course, the lineup scored just one run, too, so it’s not all on the relievers — McLean was the only one who seemed to get the job done on Thursday for New York. The Tigers are reeling It’s probably not great when a team is 13 games into a season but has already managed to lose five in a row. That’s the situation the Tigers find themselves in after being swept by the Twins, with Detroit now just 4-9 on the season after sitting at .500 on Saturday following an 11-6 win over the Cardinals. The Tigers nearly won this one, too, or at least had a great chance of it. The game was tied 1-1 in the eighth after Detroit finally scored in the prior inning with a sac fly from DH Gleyber Torres, but the Twins answered back with two in the very next frame. Shortstop Brooks Lee — who entered into the game as a defensive substitution in the top of the eighth after a pinch-hitter replaced starting shortstop Tristan Gray — ended up singling in two runs off of the Tigers’ new pitcher for the inning, Will Vest. Detroit didn’t have any more runs to score, and Minnesota swept. Bad news for Detroit, sure, but the Twins have won four in a row and are in second in the AL Central. Well, okay, that is also bad news for Detroit. An A’s-Yanks pitchers duel Just one run scored when the Athletics and Yankees faced off on Thursday. And it didn’t score until the seventh inning. Lefty Jeffrey Springs got the start for the A’s and went seven scoreless with six strikeouts against a pair of walks while giving up just one hit – huge news for a team that needs its rotation to improve – and Yankees’ southpaw Ryan Weathers was nearly as good. He got through eight innings with seven strikeouts and no walks, but gave up far more hits: seven in total. While Weathers mostly scattered those hits and avoided giving up any runs, two in a row doomed him and the Yankees in the seventh. Designated hitter Max Muncy led off the inning with a triple to right on a sinker he hit right out of the bottom of the zone, and then left fielder Tyler Soderstrom immediately followed up with a single to right to score him. Weathers sat the A’s down the rest of the inning, and then came back out for the eighth for a 1-2-3 frame. New York’s offense couldn’t make it happen against the Athletics’ bullpen, either — Justin Sterner and Hogan Harris combined for two hitless innings of relief — and the Yankees would lose the series finale, 1-0, for their second loss in a row: their first back-to-back defeats of 2026. That baseball is dead It could be worse, though. The Yankees could be this baseball, never to thrive again. But no, they get to try again on Friday, against the Rays.