PLAYOFF GAME AT PETCO BUT NO PADRES IN SIGHT

Baseball tapped into the time-space continuum Tuesday, bending what seemed real or sensical. Enormous, playoff-impacting moments transpired inside Petco Park to near silence beyond the simulated crowd noise pumped through the PA system.

What happened 1,200 miles away, at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas, caused the concrete in the parking lot just down the street, where Padres fans were watching on giant TV screens, to seemingly ripple.

As the night marched on, images and sounds in two far-flung cities tumbled hopelessly out of sync.

“It’s strange,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. Succinct and spot-on, given Major League Baseball’s contorted postseason cosmos where bubbles rearrange the location of all those critical at-bats.

At Petco, Yankees outfielder Giancarlo Stanton kept launching home runs into the San Diego night — leaving the yard in the second and fourth innings, one night after hitting a grand slam against the Rays. Two time zones away, the team

making the mortgage payments on the place where the 6-foot-6, 245-pound slugger abused baseballs dug in against Dodgers starter Walker Buehler.

“It was definitely strange watching the Yankee game (Monday) night in San Diego,” Padres first baseman Eric Hosmer said. “Especially before the game, seeing all my teammates on the posters outside the stadium (during TV coverage). … We're staying in the same hotel as the Dodgers, so obviously that's a different situation and something you're not used to.”

In the parking lot along Imperial Avenue holding the real baseball energy Tuesday night, a baseball rivalry that sparked a romance braced for the first postseason matchup between the Padres and Dodgers.

Ryan and Corie Ross of Sacramento, who paid $300 for the drive-in game watch, met at spring training in 2013. Ryan, a diehard Dodgers fan, saw Corie, born and raised in Chula Vista, wearing her Padres hat. The meeting unfolded at, of all places, a Giants game.

Just like the current series between the teams, some chirping started — about apparel choices.

“The rivalry and relationship started around baseball, so it's kind of in our blood,” Ryan said.

The married pair brought their 1-year-old son along for the unique baseball ride. His name? Um, Clayton.

“His mother picked it,” Ryan said. “Kind of,” Corie said. Mom gave dad a list of “C” names in tribute to her first name and considered “R” names from his. He used the opening to sneak in Clayton, as in Game 2 NLDS starter Clayton Kershaw. The couple's pickup held four lawn chairs so parents could join, with a playpen set up on the ground.

Reminded that Clayton doesn't come out of the pen, Ryan smiled.

“Good point,” he said. As the Padres and pitcher Mike Clevinger faced the Dodgers in Texas, the Yankees and Rays continued the ALDS at Petco Park.

Across the lot, Steve Craig of La Mesa settled in next to his wife, Julie. Craig has owned Padres season tickets since 1978.

The thought of watching the Padres face the Dodgers in the playoffs for the first time in a parking lot caused a smile to creep on his face.

“I never would have seen that in my future,” he said. “But we're all about supporting this team, no matter what it takes. This gets us a lot closer to that ballpark experience.”

Meanwhile, the harmonic hiccups continued.

Twenty-year-old Padres pitcher Ryan Weathers, someone who had not pitched above Single-A Fort Wayne, suddenly faced the prospect of making his bigleague debut … in the playoffs … against the Dodgers … during a viral pandemic that transformed baseball's October normal into anything but.

Manny Margot roamed the outfield where he broke through in the bigs, but the team that unlocked the door for the current Ray stretched out in Texas. Hunter Renfroe, his teammate with both teams, came out of a familiar clubhouse in a far less familiar uniform.

Padres radio voices Ted Leitner and Jesse Agler called a game played in the shadow of Dallas from a San Diego booth as the Yankees and Rays tangled below.

All of it, par for the pandemic course.

COVID-19 tossed baseball's march through October into a blender.

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts, who briefly held that interim role with the Padres, was asked about managerial musical chairs. In his office at Dodger Stadium, Roberts helped A's counterpart Bob Melvin settle in. That allowed nicer digs than the lower seed, the reviled Astros, who remain baseball's Villain No. 1 after their epic cheating scandal was exposed.

Meanwhile, Roberts grabbed the chair of Rangers manager Chris Woodward, his former third-base coach in Los Angeles.

“So, it is odd,” Roberts said. “I got a text from Mark Kotsay, who is quality (control) coach (for the A's) and is a good friend of mine. I just told him to lead Bob to my wine. I've got good high-end liquors in there. Some whiskeys. I've got some cigars. So, what's mine is theirs.”

Perhaps it's a kinder, gentler baseball pandemic — one liquor cabinet raid at a time.

Strange things always happen in the playoffs. This time, far more than we ever thought possible.