Cubs draw road Wild Card Series against Padres after Saturday results

The Cubs' postseason destination is set before their final regular-season game. San Diego's 10-7 win over Arizona and Philadelphia's 12-1 loss to Tampa Bay on Saturday fixed Chicago as the National League's No. 5 seed. The Cubs will visit the No. 4-seeded Padres for a best-of-three Wild Card Series beginning Tuesday, September 29.

The Chicago Sun-Times reported the bracket change after both games ended. The live Padres–Diamondbacks score and Rays–Phillies score independently confirm the two results. San Diego moved two games ahead of Chicago with one Cubs game left. Chicago owns the head-to-head tiebreaker against San Diego, but a one-game remaining schedule cannot erase a two-game deficit. The Phillies' loss also prevents them from passing Chicago for the second Wild Card position.

That settles the place and opponent, while leaving several baseball decisions open. The Cubs still have Sunday's regular-season finale against the Red Sox, a game shifted to the Tampa Bay area by weather. They can use it to assess who is available, how to arrange rest and what their lineup looks like before Tuesday. But its result will not move the Wild Card Series to Wrigley Field. MLB's postseason format gives the higher seed all games of the opening best-of-three round, so the series will be played in San Diego.

The matchup brings back a familiar opponent. MLB's 2026 postseason-team rundown notes that the Cubs beat the Padres in last year's three-game Wild Card Series. That result offers recent history, but it does not decide this series. San Diego earned home field this time, and Chicago enters with pitching choices to make after its late-season run.

One question is how the Cubs will line up their starters. The team's existing rotation report discusses Kevin Gausman's shoulder status and Chicago's options. No Game 1 starter is confirmed in the sources checked for this report, so assigning one now would get ahead of the club. The same applies to a final postseason roster.

Chicago can focus its Sunday choices on preparation rather than seeding. The first pitch, rotation and roster details for Tuesday should be checked against official team or MLB announcements when released. What is already fixed is the route: the Cubs must win two games in San Diego to advance. Every game in the opening round will be away from Wrigley Field, making the Saturday scoreboard a consequential result for a club that had been competing for home field earlier in the week.