Padres’ Fernando Tatis Jr. draws David Ortiz comparison after Game 3 heroics.
Xander Bogaerts compared Fernando Tatis Jr. to one of the best playoff performers of all time.
The San Diego Padres are well on track to pulling off another upset against the NL West champion Los Angeles Dodgers in the NLDS. Buoyed by another electric performance from star right fielder Fernando Tatis Jr., the Padres took a 6-5 win in Game 3 to take a 2-1 lead in the series, putting them to within just one victory away of advancing to the NLCS.
Tatis has been the biggest thorn in the Dodgers’ side so far in the NLDS. He is currently posting incredible numbers through three games (1.988 OPS, three home runs and five runs batted in), and there appears to be no way to stop the Padres right fielder from raking the way he has done in the playoffs to this point.
In fact, Tatis has already drawn a lofty comparison to one of the greatest playoff performers of all time from Padres teammate Xander Bogaerts, who most notably won two World Series titles with the Boston Red Sox back in the day.
“David [Ortiz] did it a long time. But for how young (Tatis) is, you don’t see many people doing what he’s doing right now. He’s really putting us on his back right now. It’s special to see,” Bogaerts said following the Padres’ Game 3 win, per Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic.
David Ortiz was one of the best postseason performers of his time, as it feels as though he came up with all of the huge hits for the Red Sox during their World Series runs in 2004, 2007, and 2013. Even during series where Ortiz has struggled as a whole, he delivered when it mattered the most, as evidenced by his epic grand slam in Game 2 of the 2013 ALCS.
Now, it remains to be seen if Tatis could ever match Ortiz’s long history of stellar playoff production. This playoff run is his first after all, as he wasn’t a part of the Padres squad that made it to the NLCS back in 2022. But you can get the sense that Tatis is especially built for these moments, and he’s proving this to be the case in the early goings of his playoff career.
Can Padres star Fernando Tatis Jr. follow in David Ortiz’s footsteps?
Fernando Tatis Jr. has been a productive player for the Padres for a long time that it’s easy to forget that he’s only 25 years of age. Tatis is only tasting postseason baseball for the first time, but he’s already coming through for the team, and against the best team in the MLB (record-wise) no less.
