What we learned at Monday’s workout at Wrigley FIeld before the wild-card series opener between the Chicago Cubs and San Diego Padres.

CHICAGO — Pete Crow-Armstrong, the Chicago Cubs’ uniquely talented center fielder, did not bury the lede in his essay for The Players’ Tribune, hyping up Major League Baseball’s postseason tournament: “I feel like I’ve been f—in’ searching for something lately.”

Major League Baseball adopted the best-of-three format in 2022. Since then, the team winning Game 1 has won the series EVERY time. Winning two straight after losing the first would not seem to be so daunting, but it has proved to be just that.

CHICAGO – Cubs lefty Shota Imanaga spun around on the mound, grimaced and threw his head back, looking to the heavens. Manny Machado tossed away his bat and turned to his Padres teammates in the first-base dugout,

So yes, Wednesday’s do-or-die Game 3 against the Padres will start at 4:08 Chicago time and will be broadcast on ESPN after the Dodgers/Reds series ended after two games. The best-of-three Wild Card format started in 2022 and in the previous 12 series, only two of them went to three games. This year, three of the four went to three games.

An unexpected decision by the Cubs manager in the fifth inning of Game 2 gave the Padres a lead they did not relinquish.

The Padres’ Mason Miller throws a pitch in the seventh inning against the Cubs during Game 2 of the National League wild-card series at Wrigley Field on Oct. 1, 2025.

David Ross, who served as the Cubs' skipper from 2020 to 2023, was fired in November of the latter year when Chicago stole Craig Counsell from the division-rival Milwaukee Brewers. In two offseasons since, Ross has been passed over by teams looking for new skippers, and his third attempt to find work is about to commence.