For the first time in five seasons, the San Diego Padres are headed into September on top of the National League West. That means the Padres control their own destiny as they vie for a postseason birth. “Really, if we just go out there and win we don\u2019t have to worry about (second-place) San Francisco. We don\u2019t have to worry about Colorado, the Dodgers or Arizona,” said Padres closer Heath Bell, “because as long as we take care of business, we don\u2019t have to worry about anybody else.” After a road-heavy August, 17 of the Padres\u2019 29 games in September are at home. They open the month with 14 straight divisional contests, including a 10-game homestand against the Rockies, Dodgers and Giants Sept. 3-12. “In September, we\u2019re home a lot and we\u2019d rather play people on our home turf than have to go on the road and play them,” Bell said. Last year, the Padres had a successful September under different circumstances. They came into the month last in the division and finished 17-9 to end the season in fourth place \u2014 12 games under .500. “The only difference is, we know we\u2019re playing for something,” Bell said. “Last year, we weren\u2019t really playing for anything. We were just playing for pride. Now, we are just going and playing and we have the hopes and dreams of the postseason ahead of us.” In the 2005 season, the last time the Padres held a division lead headed into September, they were led by the likes of Phil Nevin, Mark Loretta, Brian Giles, Jake Peavy and Adam Eaton, and were favorites to advance to the postseason from a medicore division. This year, Bell feels critics still doubt the Padres, even though they\u2019ve been on top of the division since late April. “We\u2019ve been ahead all year long and nobody has given us the credit. Nobody has really believed in us except this locker room and the front office and the Padres organization,” Bell said. “I think we still feel like we\u2019re the underdogs even though we\u2019re in first.” Of their division opponents, the Padres have had the most success against the second-place Giants. Their 9-2 mark against the Northern California foes helps balance out losing records against both the Rockies (4-8) and Dodgers (5-7). “It\u2019s funny because we have the Giants\u2019 number,” Bell said. “The Dodgers kind of have our number, Arizona has got our number at their house. In our house, we have their number. It\u2019s kind of weird how that works.” Similarly strange has been the Padres\u2019 success in 2010 despite a lack of star power outside of Adrian Gonzalez. And trade deadline deals for veterans and former all-stars Miguel Tejada and Ryan Ludwick haven\u2019t appeared to upset the chemistry in the clubhouse. “There haven\u2019t been many Major League Baseball teams that are true teams, and we\u2019re definitely a team,” Bell said. “Individually, you might be able to beat us up. But as a group? No chance.” In the driver\u2019s seat with the postseason on the horizon, a consistent September will bring playoff baseball back to San Diego. Thus far, consistency hasn\u2019t been a problem \u2014 the Padres only have one losing streak of more than three games all season long. “Overall, we haven\u2019t put a huge losing streak together and we\u2019ve stayed consistent,” Bell said. “We may lose a game here or there, but we don\u2019t lose a bunch of them. That\u2019s one of the reasons we\u2019ve been on top.” Padres upcoming home opponents<\/b> Sept. 3-5 Rockies Sept. 6-8 Dodgers Sept. 9-12 Giants Sept. 24-26 Reds Sept. 27-30 Cubs PADRES PEPPER Padres fans to stand up to cancer during STANDiego<\/b> During the Padres\u2019 Sept. 9 game against the Giants, fans in section 133 will stand for the entire game and wear T-shirts in support of Stand Up To Cancer. The team has reserved 685 seats for STANDiego, which will be sold in four pricing levels ranging from $30 to $1,250. The Petco Park event precedes the annual Stand Up To Cancer national telecast on Sept. 10. Stand Up To Cancer raises funds to accelerate research for new therapies for cancer patients, and the Padres aim to raise $500,000 during the event. Petco Park to host Oktoberfest Sept. 24<\/b> The Padres will hold their Oktoberfest celebration at Petco Park on Sept. 24 beginning at 4 p.m. Admission to the fest is free with a paid ticket to the Friars\u2019 game that evening against the Cincinnati Reds. More than 25 breweries are expected to take part in the event.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For the first time in five seasons, the San Diego Padres are headed into September on top of the National League West. That means the Padres control their own destiny as they vie for a postseason birth. “Really, if we just go out there and win we don\u2019t have to worry about (second-place) San Francisco. […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11556","_seopress_titles_title":"Padres control playoff destiny heading into their final month","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11556,11593,11553,11550],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-294540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-downtown-news","category-no-images","category-sports","category-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294540"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294540\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}