During the 2022 regular season, the Dodgers posted a dominating 15-4 record against the San Diego Padres, including taking six of the final nine games against them in September.

That’s the good news.

The not-so-good news is that those same Padres absolutely smoked the New York Mets on Sunday evening in Game-3 of the 2022 National League Wild Card Series at Citi Field by a score of 6-0 to advance to the 2022 National League Division Series against the Dodgers, and they looked exceptionally good in doing so, garnering 10 hits while limiting the Mets to exactly one.

In other words, the Dodgers will be facing a Padres team that is playing their best baseball of the season right now and will be a very worthy opponent for the 111-51 NL West Champs when the 2022 NLDS kicks off at 6:37 p.m. PT on Tuesday evening at Dodger Stadium.

As every Dodgers fan knows, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts has repeatedly declined to say who his Game-1 starter will be, although it will undoubtedly be either 26-year-old left-hander Julio Urías or 34-year-old left-hander Clayton Kershaw, with oddsmakers leaning towards Urías, who finished the 2022 regular season with a 17-7 record and a National League-best 2.16 ERA. Then again, the 15-year MLB veteran Kershaw finished his injury-shortened 2022 regular season with a 12-3 record and an equally impressive 2.28 ERA, so there’s that; not to mention the fact that Kershaw has been the Dodgers Game-1 starter for every postseason series for the past decade.

On Sunday evening, media members were notified that Roberts would be meeting with them at 3:30 p.m. PT on Monday afternoon and the Game-1 starter at 4:00 p.m. PT, so the cat will soon (finally) be let out of the bag.

Stay tuned…

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