Ask an MLB fan to name the sport's greatest rivalries, and you're likely to come across the same, well-worn answers: Yankees-Red Sox, Cubs-Cardinals, Dodgers-Giants, and on and on. But all due respect to the histories involved, those are so 2010s. If you're looking for where the real heat is right now, a rivalry so juiced the teams can barely stand to share the same field with each other, there's only one answer: Dodgers-Padres, a divisional afterthought that has in recent years become must-see TV.
And we're about to see a whole lot of it over the next couple of weeks, with San Diego and L.A. set to square off in two three-game series with NL West supremacy on the line. The last time these two teams faced off, there were benches clearing all over the place and even the managers were bumping chests. Now, San Diego is threatening to snatch the Dodgers' crown, and there's no telling what's in store.
But how did we get here? How did an in-state matchup that was barely on the radar even 10 or 15 years ago suddenly come to dominate the sport? Let's look back on seven electric moments over the last five years that have poured gasoline on a powder keg that was already waiting to explode.
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1. 2020: The rivalry is born
While the Padres and Dodgers are separated by just 120 miles and have shared a division for decades, this had never really felt like a rivalry — largely because the two teams struggled to both be competitive at the same time. But that all changed in a big way in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, with San Diego bursting onto the scene for the first time in years and the Dodgers desperate to finally capture another World Series title.
Things began to boil over during the final meeting of the regular season, when Trent Grisham spent a bit too long admiring a homer off of Clayton Kershaw. The Dodgers dugout objected, and wasn't shy about letting him know it. Flash forward just a few weeks, when the two teams squared off in the 2020 NLDS. After Cody Bellinger robbed Fernando Tatis Jr. of a would-be homer in Game 2, Dodgers reliever Brusdar Graterol flipped his hat, drawing the ire of Manny Machado ... to which Graterol responded by blowing him a kiss.
The Dodgers hung on for a 6-5 win and would go on to sweep the best-of-five. Let's just say it's been on ever since.
2. October 2022: San Diego slays the giant
L.A. did win it all in 2020, but San Diego would exact some measure of revenge two years later, when a deadline haul that included Josh Hader and Juan Soto helped push the Padres to an upset of the 111-win Dodgers in the NLDS. The Padres stole Game 2 at Dodger Stadium, then won two in a row inside a truly raucous Petco Park. The dagger: a five-run rally in the seventh inning of Game 4, punctuated by Jake Cronenworth's two-out, two-run single off of Alex Vesia.
For years, San Diego had been considered the little brother of this rivalry, the small market down the freeway that would never be rich enough or talented enough to hang with one of the most storied franchises in American sport. This served as a message that the Padres didn't plan on backing down from anyone, and the Dodgers needed to be on notice.
3. 2023: Crying Kershaw
Perhaps emboldened by finally slaying the dragon the year prior, the Padres entered 2023 brimming with confidence and looking to knock L.A. off its perch in the NL West. And when San Diego took the first head-to-head meeting of the season, they made sure to let the Dodgers know, even going so far as to post an instantly iconic image of Kershaw on the Jumbotron with cartoon tears streaming down his face.
Kershaw wasn't thrilled about it at the time, but it was the Dodgers who would get the last laugh. San Diego would lose its next three series, including five in a row to L.A., before eventually missing the playoffs at 82-80. The Dodgers, meanwhile, cruised to yet another division title.
4. April 2024: Jurickson Profar becomes Mr. Relevant
The Padres were back for more the very next year, albeit without Soto this time and with drastically lower expectations. But if the Dodgers thought San Diego was about to roll over, the Padres disabused them of that notion just a few weeks into the regular season.
During a series at Dodger Stadium in April, then-Padres outfielder Jurickson Profar took issue with Gavin Stone throwing him up and in. Catcher Will Smith wasn't too impressed, exchanging words with Profar at home plate before calling him “kind of irrelevant” to reporters after the game. Profar's response? A bases-clearing double later that night that spurred the Padres to a victory — and earned him the nickname "Mr. Relevant".
5. October 2024: An NLDS for the ages
That was mere prelude to the main event, however, as the two teams squared off in the NLDS for the third time in five years. And this time, sparks really started flying.
Game 2 had just about everything. Jurickson Profar dove into the Dodger Stadium stands to rob a homer, then had some fun with fans afterwards. In the sixth inning, Fernando Tatis Jr. got drilled by Dodgers starter Jack Flaherty, after which Profar and Smith started jawing at home plate once again. Flaherty then struck out Machado, and the two spent the next half-inning or so exchanging words — setting up a chaotic sequence in which the Dodgers, led by Roberts, accused Machado of throwing a ball at the L.A. dugout. (Machado, for his part, claimed he was just giving the ball to a bat boy at the conclusion of his pre-inning warmup.)
At that point, things went fully off the rails. A fan in the stands threw a baseball at Profar in left field, causing a delay of over 10 minutes while security and the umpiring crew tried to get things back under control. When the dust settled, San Diego came away with a convincing 10-2 win, but it was the Dodgers who would rally from a 2-1 deficit to take the series in five games.
6. December 2024-January 2025: The Roki Sasaki Sweepstakes
Sure, this didn't involve any actual baseball, but real rivalries know no offseason. While other teams made a run at landing Roki Sasaki during his free agency this past winter, it was clear almost from the jump that this would be a two-team battle between the Dodgers and Padres. L.A. had already poached countrymen Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto in their effort to establish a pipeline to Japan, but Sasaki's reported desire to chart his own path and avoid the spotlight left San Diego thinking it had more than a puncher's chance.
Yeah, about that. Turns out Sasaki was just fine following in Ohtani's footsteps: He chose the Dodgers in mid-January, leaving the Padres at the altar and turning up his nose at a recruiting effort that had spanned multiple years (and even included dinner with some of San Diego's biggest stars).
7. June 2025: Another dust-up at Dodger Stadium
All of which brings us to this season, with the Dodgers defending another World Series crown and the Padres once again desperate to finally, at long last, get over the hump and shift the balance of power in the NL West for good. At this point, this is beyond sports hate; these players and fan bases just straight-up don't like each other. So is it any surprise that tempers flared almost immediately?
The two teams met a whopping seven times in an 11-day span in the middle of June, a stretch that featured multiple benches-clearing incidents and both Roberts and Mike Shildt getting ejected. There were not one but two beanball wars involving both Tatis Jr. and Ohtani, one of which prompted Roberts and Shildt to begin bumping each other in foul territory.
That was the last time the two teams saw each other. What's changed since? Well, the Padres are surging on the heels of one of the most dramatic trade deadline overhauls we've ever seen, while the Dodgers are floundering after an embarrassing sweep at the hands of the intracity rival Angels. This time, it's San Diego that finds itself in sole possession of first place, with six matchups to come over the next 10 days. What will these two series have in store? We'll just have to wait to find out.