MEXICO CITY \u2014 The Padres are in the midst of a stretch where they can hardly hit.<\/p>\n
Anywhere.<\/p>\n
Not even in the mountains.<\/p>\n
But they are showing they know how to win.<\/p>\n
They did it Saturday in a ballpark some 1,500 miles south of San Diego brimming with Padres fans from near and far.<\/p>\n
With fervor rivaling any place the Padres have played, including Petco Park, the crowd at Estadio Alfredo Harp Hel\u00fa launched into a \u201cHoly Sheets\u201d chant several times, cheered for Fernando Tatis Jr. as if he was a native son and delivered a slightly accented \u201cLet\u2019s Go Padres\u201d late in the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was an awesome experience to have the crowd behind us like that,\u201d Gavin Sheets said. \u201c\u2026 We could definitely feed off that. We knew we could stay in this game, and if we got a shot in the late innings, we could do what we\u2019ve done all year.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Padres\u2019 seventh comeback victory \u2014 and fifth from a deficit of four or more runs \u2014 came Saturday against the Diamondbacks when they scored four runs in the seventh inning and held on to win 6-4.<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes, you don\u2019t quite know how your team can play in some of these games,\u201d manager Craig Stammen said. \u201cAnd so far this season, we\u2019ve been able to come back. And I think once you feel that building in the season, that becomes a little bit of your identity and who you are. And so far that\u2019s been who we are.\u201d<\/p>\n
Down 4-1 when the seventh inning began, the Padres scored four times on two walks, a single, an error, a hit batter and two sacrifice flies.<\/p>\n
It was the 10th time this season they won a game by scoring the deciding run in the final three innings. That is over half their victories, as their 18-8 (a .692 winning percentage) record stands as best in the major leagues by percentage points over the Braves (19-9, .679).<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what a good team does,\u201d Tatis said. \u201cWe\u2019re battling out there. \u2026 Right now, we\u2019re rolling together and figuring out how to play good baseball.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Diamondbacks could not say the same, as an error that likely prevented a double play helped the Padres\u2019 big inning continue.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Padres are a good baseball team,\u201d Arizona manager Torey Lovullo said. \u201c\u2026 But the D-backs beat the D-backs today.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Diamondbacks scored all four of their runs in the second inning against Germ\u00e1n M\u00e1rquez, who then pitched through the sixth.<\/p>\n
Adrian Morej\u00f3n worked a scoreless seventh and Jason Adam a scoreless eighth before Mason Miller retired all three batters he faced in the ninth to earn his 10th save and set a franchise record by extending his scoreless streak to 34\u2154 innings.<\/p>\n
The Padres\u2019 only run in the first six innings came on a home run by Ty France in the fifth off Brandon Pfaadt, who had taken over for starter Zac Gallen, who departed following the third inning after being hit in his throwing shoulder by a line drive.<\/p>\n
Pfaadt was on the mound at the start of the seventh, though not for long. He departed after walking Jackson Merrill, surrendering a single by Manny Machado and walking Xander Bogaerts.<\/p>\n
Right-hander Taylor Clarke came in, and Sheets greeted him with a single to right field that scored Merrill and Machado.<\/p>\n
France followed with a grounder up the middle that might have been a double play had Diamondbacks shortstop Geraldo Perdomo not dropped the ball as he went to dish it to second baseman Ildemaro Vargas.<\/p>\n
Perdomo sprained his ankle on the play and left the game.<\/p>\n
With the bases loaded and nobody out, Freddy Fermin\u2019s fly ball to left field drove in Bogaerts. Jake Cronenworth then took a slider off his foot to re-load the bases, and Ram\u00f3n Laureano\u2019s deep fly ball to right field scored Sheets.<\/p>\n
France hit his second homer in the ninth inning, and the Padres finished with six hits, one fewer than the Diamondbacks.<\/p>\n
On the heels of an 11-game stretch in which they averaged six runs a game and hit .274 with an .811 OPS as a team, they are batting .213 with a .622 OPS and averaging 3.7 runs over their past seven games.<\/p>\n
And three of those were played in the mile-high air of Denver, where they hit only at the end of a 10-8 victory on Thursday.<\/p>\n
Saturday\u2019s game was played in a ballpark 2,400 feet higher than Coors Field and where three years earlier the Padres scored 22 runs and had 27 hits in two games.<\/p>\n
They have fixed the humidor at Estadio Alfredo Harp Hel\u00fa since the first MLB game here in 2023, when the Padres and Giants hit 11 home runs between them in a 16-11 Padres victory. And they replaced the turf, which in \u201923 played like cement.<\/p>\n
But it is still 7,350 feet above sea level.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought it was pretty much the same,\u201d Machado said. \u201cWe just didn\u2019t hit 20 homers like we did that last time.\u201d<\/p>\n
But where the offensive outburst and two victories over the Giants three years ago got the Padres to a game over .500 in a season that ended with them two games out of a playoff spot, they are in first place in the National League West and seem to be an entirely different kind of team.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got a great team,\u201d Machado said. \u201cWe know what we have. We know what we\u2019re capable of doing. \u2026 We\u2019re not rolling and we\u2019re not flowing on all cylinders as a group, as an offense. We\u2019re not. But we take the at-bats that we need to take.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MEXICO CITY \u2014 The Padres are in the midst of a stretch where they can hardly hit. Anywhere.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":683027,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2404],"tags":[146,22,4314,5,38,853,4,18,185,3546],"class_list":{"0":"post-683026","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arizona-diamondbacks","8":"tag-arizona","9":"tag-arizona-diamondbacks","10":"tag-arizonadiamondbacks","11":"tag-baseball","12":"tag-diamondbacks","13":"tag-latest-headlines","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-san-diego-padres","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-top-stories-sdut"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116469250375168554","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/683026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=683026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/683026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/683027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=683026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=683026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=683026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}