The San Francisco Giants came into their first series against the San Diego Padres still smarting from a rough opening week against the New York Yankees. It looked like their division rivals might pile on, but instead, the Giants fought back, taking two of three games and leaving San Diego with the same 2-4 record as the Padres. From there, though, these two teams took very different paths.

The Padres caught fire, posting an impressive 18-7 record in April, while the Giants stumbled to an 11-15 mark. The real surprise wasn't that the Giants struggled—it was how dominant the Padres became. After all, this was supposed to be a rebuilding year for San Diego. With tight finances limiting general manager AJ Preller's free-agent moves and a depleted farm system from years of big trades, expectations were low. Their opening series against the Tigers only scored seven runs, tying them with the Rockies and just ahead of the Diamondbacks, putting all four non-Dodger teams in the NL West at the bottom of the league in scoring. Their 66 wRC+ ranked them sixth-worst in baseball. It didn't look sustainable—and it probably isn't.

Then came the news that the Padres sold at a valuation of $3.9 billion, and something clicked. The team seemed energized, competing with the Dodgers for the top of the NL West. But there's one quirky storyline running through all that winning: Fernando Tatis Jr. has yet to hit a home run this season.

Through 32 games and 139 plate appearances, Tatis is slashing .261/.333/.311 with just four doubles and a triple. He's been a menace on the basepaths, going 9-for-11 in stolen base attempts, and his defense in right field remains stellar. So where did the power go? Is he suffering from the same slump that's plagued Matt Chapman? Not according to Statcast, which places him in the 99th percentile for hard-hit rate. As MLB.com's Thomas Harrigan notes, "While he has been hitting rockets, he hasn't been producing contact that's conducive to slugging, recording the lowest pull and fly-ball rates of his career." The warning is clear: "At some point, though, the dam is going to break." Could that moment come at Oracle Park, where Tatis owns a career .908 OPS? Giants fans better hope not.