Walker Buehler Details Work Behind the Scenes That Led to Dominant Outing for Padres

The San Diego Padres are finally clicking after a slow start to the 2026 season. San Diego has now won four straight games — and five of their last six overall — including taking their most recent series from the Colorado Rockies.

In this series, the Padres got an impressive outing from right-hander Walker Buehler, helping the team beat Colorado, 5-2. The performance by Buehler was a welcome sight after he struggled to start the new season.

Buehler fired six shutout innings against the Rockies in the second game of the series, easily the best start of his Padres career. The right-hander only allowed three hits over the six innings, striking out four batters in the process.

This was the type of start San Diego envisioned from Buehler when they signed him over the offseason to a minor league contract. But the veteran has been working very hard to get his stuff on the mound back into form.

“A little more urgency,” Buehler said of his start. “Obviously, kind of mentally and [physically] struggling the first two. The coaching staff and I have been doing a lot of work and the strength staff and training staff, trying to get back to some things that I used to do really well. And I just think the throw is improving and the delivery is improving. So really good to get a good one under my belt.”

Over his MLB career, Buehler has fared decently against the Rockies. The right-hander owns a 7-4 record with an ERA of 4.48 and 128 strikeouts over 24 appearances.

So far with San Diego, Buehler has made three starts for the team, posting an ERA of 4.97 overall. The veteran has struck out 11 batters over 12.2 innings of work.

Amid all of the inconsistency and different injuries to Padres starting pitchers, this outing from Buehler was great to see. The veteran had been struggling on the mound, and many believed that another poor outing from him could cause San Diego to make some changes to the pitching staff.

Multiple times since joining the team, Buehler has praised the work from Padres hitting coach Ruben Niebla. Buehler has said that Niebla gets a lot of credit for helping him figure some things out on the mound since signing with San Diego.

If Buehler can take this performance against the Rockies and continue to push forward, maybe he can remain in the rotation for good. But he will need to remain consistent, especially considering that San Diego is looking to compete for a World Series title this year.