Michael the Dancing King leads the Padres past the Braves in Game 1

In your most arrogant and correct ballet teacher voice, repeat after me: “Demi-plié and stretch.” Demi-plié and stretch.” The demi-plié is the first basic movement taught to new ballerinas. Its name means “little bend” in French. When pitching from the windup, Michael King takes his turn, gently bends his knees, and then stands tall for a moment before delivering the pitch. Aside from his lack of range of motion and hip joint, King went about his business Tuesday with the precision and artistry of a dancer.

For Ballerinas, efficiency of movement is paramount, and King needed just 89 pitches to go seven innings while allowing just five hits, walking absolutely no one, and recording twelve strikeouts. His performance received a standing ovation from the crowd at Petco Park and he went home happy after the Padres earned a 4-0 victory over the Braves in Game 1 of the best-of-three NL Wild Card Series.

King stole the show with a well-choreographed approach that has served him well all year, and he executed every step at a high level. And lest we forget, this is King's first season in a full-time starting role, his first year strategically putting his pitches together in the rhythm and flow of a start. Knowing that his goals now include facing batters with both hands multiple times and throwing six or more innings each time, King has upgraded the three-pitch arsenal he debuted with to a five-pitch ensemble further developed, which he uses specifically.

King's main goal on the mound is to throw four throws from his hand that look exactly the same but branch horizontally in different directions with different amounts of movement and different speeds. His sinker and changeup break about 17 inches on the arm side, but at different speeds (93 mph and 87 mph, respectively) and with the advantage of a seam-shifted track to affect the hitter's intuition about where the pitch is headed could. His sweeper and pusher move on the glove side, both at about 84 mph, but the sweeper has 15 inches of travel while the pusher only slides about 4 inches. Additionally, the spin on all four throws is similar to the hitter's, as King mirrors the direction of his spin. The sinker and changeup rotate on approximately the same axis as the sweeper and slider, but in the opposite direction. And as it turns out, a common axis of rotation is enough to confuse hitters, considering they have little time to identify a pitch. To add at least one vertical element to the otherwise sideways guessing game, King throws a four-seam fastball with about twice as much pitch as all other pitches to prevent the batter from stopping at eye level. His mastery of the four-seater allows him to run pas-de-bourrée around the top half and shadow areas of the zone, rarely tripping over the heart of the plate.

But it's not just about what throws King throws; The order, context and execution also play a role. Any good ballet teacher will tell you that if you practice a one-sided movement on the right side, you must also practice it on the left side. I'm not saying that pitchers need to be ambidextrous, but rather that starting pitchers need an approach that works for both righties and lefties. Or in King's case, a modified approach for each handedness. Atlanta's righty batters saw primarily sinkers (37%), with a healthy dose of sweepers (23%), four-seamers (23%) and sliders (14%). Lefties, meanwhile, received a 37 percent portion of change, along with smaller portions of sinkers (26 percent), sweepers (16 percent) and four-seamers (16 percent). Pumping changeups to lefties keeps them away from the sinker, a pitch prone to platoon weaknesses by exhibiting similar moves at a speed that disrupts their timing.

The final component of King's transition from utility player to starter was improving his efficiency by learning to aim for different outcomes: “It's really just about finding the soft contact. This was a big deal of mine and I had to learn to look for it. As a substitute, I just wanted to swing and miss,” King recently told reporters. “Obviously as a starter you want to be able to add length to the team, and if you rely on swing-and-miss on every throw, you're never going to get deep into games.”

King threw fewer than 20 pitches in each of his seven innings and needed just nine pitches to get through each of his final two frames. And although he had 12 strikeouts, four were on just three pitches and none required more than five pitches. Otherwise, he managed to induce soft contact and average an exit velocity of 87.5 mph over 14 balls in play. The hardest hits of the night were a 104.1 mph single by Michael Harris II in the third inning and a 102.5 mph double by Travis d'Arnaud in the fourth inning. And far from looking shaky on the third down in the order, King had Atlanta's hitters doing an incomprehensible interpretive dance in the box as they swung at sweepers out of the zone or rolled over a sinker that fell off the table.

Although King delivered a masterful performance, the Braves' offense as constructed in 2024 is experiencing more boom or bust than in years past, and the lineup's most reliable spark plug enters the postseason in something of a lull, at least by his own standards. Marcell Ozuna posted a wRC+ of 117 in September, compared to his 154 mark this season.

Meanwhile, Ozzie Albies, normally a switch-hitter, has been batting exclusively from the right side since returning from an IL stint due to a broken left wrist less than two weeks ago. Although Albies went 3 for 7 with a double and a home run in Monday's doubleheader against the Mets, he struck out all three times he faced the right-handed King from the right side of the plate. Firstly, Albies seemed stunned that the sweepers got away from him and landed on the outside half of the board. He was then tricked into a similar location by a sinker.

An offense that ranks ninth in the league in strikeout rate and doesn't run much but ranks first in hard-hit rate relies heavily on doing damage once or twice per game, to score runs, which is a tough matchup against a pitcher who specializes in damage control – especially when the offense isn't running at its best. Atlanta manager Brian Snitker knew what his team was up against and had to prepare for the matchup between King and the San Diego bullpen.

If you've ever seen an action movie, you've probably noticed that the fight scenes are just as carefully choreographed as in any ballet. But instead of a one-on-one duel between King and every Braves batter, the Padres would also have to bob and sway as several Atlanta pitchers cycle through each other. And that was because Chris Sale, who was ruled out of Game 2 of Monday's doubleheader against the Mets because of back spasms, was left off the Wild Card roster and did not travel with the team to the West Coast. Snitker's other top starting options were also unveiled over the weekend, allowing him to choose from a trio of Triple-A arms backed by bullpen contingency plans. AJ Smith-Shawver beat Ian Anderson and Bryce Elder. When asked about the decision after the game, Snitker said, “We don't know (with) any of these guys what we're going to get if we start them.”

The uncertainty surrounding the starter meant Snitker had to be prepared to bring in reinforcements. The top bullpen options have also been used extensively in recent days, meaning some strategic footwork would be required to work around the weaknesses of the second-line relievers. Snitker played the matchups admirably. When Smith-Shawver found himself in trouble for the second straight inning because his changeup allowed hitters to sit fastballs, he switched to left-hander Aaron Bummer. As a unit, the Padres have a wRC+ of 96 against lefties (compared to a wRC+ of 116 against righties). But notably, Snitker sent Bummer to face the part of the San Diego lineup with the most dramatic platoon splits — Luis Arraez, Fernando Tatis Jr., Jackson Merrill, Xander Bogaerts and Jake Cronenworth — as well as Jurickson Profar and Manny Machado, those are about neutral, but inevitably sit in the middle of the lineup; The manager then pulled Bummer before moving on to the one-hitter in the Padres lineup who is particularly good with lefties: Donovan Solano.

Next up in the action sequence was 41-year-old right-wing extremist Jesse Chavez. He's not overpowering, but he throws a cutter with a distinct movement profile, limits hard contact, and posts better strikeout and walk numbers against righties than lefties, making him better suited to matchup with Solano and Kyle Higashioka. He survived against right-handed killers Arraez and Tatis Jr. before the lineup returned to more neutral matchups with Profar and Machado. Then Luke Jackson entered the fray and pitched a flawless inning before being penalized for throwing a curveball to Higashioka, who scored a game-winning run for San Diego in one hit.

After Tuesday's loss, Snitker took solace in the fact that the back end of his bullpen had a day off and will return to the stadium for Game 2 of the series on Wednesday, refreshed and ready to dance behind Max Fried, who will face him in San Diego right-hander Joe Musgrove.

But in Game 1, Michael King took center stage.