SAN DIEGO — The pull of the Padres’ conspicuous talent was on display Wednesday at Petco Park. A Hawaiian shirt giveaway helped fill the stands for the 24th sellout of the season. During a fifth-inning break in the action, through a prerecorded video-board message and from his seat near the home on-deck circle, Los Angeles Clippers forward Paul George instructed a cooperative crowd of 43,660 to make some noise. The NBA star, who was initiated into the fan base last summer, spent much of the rest of the night applauding a number of notable plays.

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Fernando Tatis Jr., Manny Machado, Xander Bogaerts and Juan Soto — George’s fellow luminaries in the sports world — had chosen a good night to put on a show. In a 5-0 shutout that furthered a potential swell of momentum, the Padres did not exactly rout the visiting Guardians. They still supplied the best demonstration yet of how their so-called Big Four can propel an entire team to a convincing victory.

“If we can do that, there’s no limit to us,” Tatis said. “I mean, this team is so talented. Everybody knows it. We know it. So it’s a matter of coming together and performing and having the result that we have tonight.”

Tatis played one of the best all-around games of his career, establishing a new franchise benchmark with his 11th career leadoff home run, clocking two doubles, stealing two bases, scoring on a wild pitch, making a sliding catch in right field and throwing out a runner at first base on a single.

Machado pounded a line drive to move within a home run of Adrián González’s all-time Petco Park record. Bogaerts walked and lined a pair of singles in one of his most encouraging performances since his return from left wrist discomfort. After striking out in his first two at-bats, Soto rustled up his trademark blend of patience and power by drawing a walk and then cranking a solo shot.

Thus, for the first time this season in a place other than Mexico City, Tatis, Machado and Soto homered in the same game. For the first time since July, the Padres hit four or more home runs in a game at Petco Park. Nelson Cruz joined in Wednesday’s laser show, coming off the bench to launch a blast in the eighth.

For the first time since early May, the Padres won on consecutive days in their offense-suppressing home stadium. It did not feel like a coincidence that all these breakthroughs came on the same night San Diego’s top four hitters submitted their strongest combined effort.

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“They can carry the team by themselves, and today was a great example,” Cruz said.

Tatis, the brightest star of the evening, provided a one-man distillation. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, he joined franchise icon Tony Gwynn as the only Padres players to record a game with a home run, multiple stolen bases and an outfield assist. He became the first major leaguer in the modern era (since 1900) to collect three extra-base hits, a home run, two runs scored, two stolen bases, a walk and an outfield assist in a single game.

The final flourish, a rare outfield assist to first base on an Amed Rosario single, reinforced how far Tatis has come as a converted shortstop and how much he could still accomplish. Wednesday marked his 61st career start in right field, and just his 47th game since he returned from suspension.

Heads-up play to deke the runner by Fernando Tatis Jr. pic.twitter.com/rgiC4sFEXd

— MLB (@MLB) June 15, 2023

“Maybe just (Josh) Hamilton,” Cruz said, when asked if he could recall a similar five-tool showcase.

“Tati out in right, man,” said Michael Wacha, who went 6 2/3 innings in his sixth scoreless start of the season. “He’s a lot of fun to watch.”

“The strides he’s made in the outfield, I guess, shouldn’t surprise us, because of his athletic ability,” manager Bob Melvin said. “But there’s been a lot of hard work involved in that. You know, he went from a guy in spring training that was still kind of trying to feel his way and now it’s, like, Gold Glove stuff.”

The Padres, as a whole and with limited success, have tried to feel their way through 2023. Because of pitchers such as Wacha and defenders such as Tatis and Ha-Seong Kim, their run prevention has been among the best in the league. Yet San Diego came into Wednesday a whopping 8 1/2 games back of first place in the National League West. The chief culprit: an underperforming offense that featured a heralded quartet of hitters who had yet to click all at once.

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Recent signs have been more promising. The Padres (33-34) have averaged 5.24 runs per game since May 21. Tatis is hitting .417/.491/.896 with five home runs in June, looking again like the MVP candidate he was before a lost 2022 season. Machado, who scuffled before suffering a fractured left hand, has hit .311/.340/.489 since coming back from that injury. Bogaerts, after a recent five-day hiatus, has returned to making consistent contact. Soto has cooled off some since a scorching May, but he has not stopped hitting the ball hard.

“We’re getting there little by little,” Soto said. “First time playing a full season all together … we all got to get the chance and go through a lot of things to see how we can make it together. So I think it’s there, we’re getting close to where we want to be and we’re right there. We can be really dangerous.”

“We’ve been searching for this kind of tempo here, and we’ve started to get it,” Melvin said. “We’ve gotten stung a little bit along the way, but it seems like we’re really starting to find our way a little bit across the board. The defense has been good. The pitching’s been good all year. Now it’s about the offense.

“It’s hard to get everybody going at the same time, but it’s gonna happen at some point.”

It might be starting to happen. The Padres have won seven of their past 10 games. Their defense, which seems unlikely to slump, offers room for error for their pitching staff. President of baseball operations A.J. Preller has drawn criticism for building a top-heavy roster with questionable depth, but he also has made surprisingly fruitful acquisitions with the likes of Wacha and Gary Sánchez. Wednesday, Sánchez did not make the kind of hard contact that has given his new team a massive lift, but he did team with Wacha on a strike-’em-out, throw-’em-out double play. And Wacha, who has quietly had one of the better pitching seasons in the NL, completed at least six innings for the seventh time in his last eight outings.

“He’s spoiling us, really,” Melvin said.

The Padres, as a whole, cannot say they have come close to meeting lofty expectations. For now, they are still a sub-.500 team, albeit one with a plus-27 run differential. They are firmly in the race for one of three wild-card spots, but the competition, perhaps, has never been this crowded. In the NL West, they are looking up at not only the first-place Diamondbacks but also the Dodgers and the Giants, who will host San Diego for a crucial four-game series next week.

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But the Padres, with all their star power, are more than capable of spoiling their fans with games like Wednesday’s. Tatis stood at his locker after the win, excitedly discussing his rapid progress in right field and the combined potential of the Big Four. He smiled when asked about yet another star. Just yards away, Paul George stood near the middle of the room, holding court with a few of Tatis’ teammates.

“I mean, the guy’s a baller,” Tatis said. “When you have people like that in front of you, you want to ball out, too.”

(Photo of Juan Soto hitting a home run Wednesday: Matt Thomas / Getty Images)

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