Padres Bats Alive, Pitching Dead in Loss

The San Diego Padres bats finally came alive on Monday. Too bad the pitching did not follow suit. It wasn’t until the seventh inning that the Friars pitchers didn’t allow a run in an inning. The top minor league clubs fared reasonably well as they continue their quest for post-season play.

On the eight pitch of the bottom half of the first from Jake Peavy (9-10), the Arizona Diamondbacks were up 2-0. A home run by Alex Cintron, on a 1-2 pitch, followed a Matt Kata single. Peavy then loaded the bases and got out of the inning allowing just one more run on a sacrifice fly by Junior Spivey. In the second Kata again scored, this time when Luis Gonzalez followed his double with a single to center to make the score 4-0.

The Padres got one back in the third when they loaded the bases on Randy Johnson (4-6) and Mark Loretta hit a sac fly.

Robby Hammock added a two run homer in the bottom of the third to extend the D-Backs lead to 6-1. Jaret Wright relieved Peavy right after the homer.

Sean Burroughs then tripled in a run in the fourth and Gary Bennett drove him in with a ground out.

Steve Finley had his own triple in the fourth and was knocked in by Shea Hillenbrand making the score 7-3.

Phil Nevin plated a Padre in the fifth with a single to keep the Padres close at 7-4.

Gonzalez then took back the run with a double to deep center knocking in Cintron who singled to make it 8-4.

The D-Backs broke it open in the sixth when Kata had a bases loaded single to drive in two and a wild pitch on Mike Matthews scored a third.

The Padres fought back in the eighth when Lou Merloni grounded out with the bases loaded to drive in one and Loretta followed with a single driving in two to make it 11-8. That was as close as they would get. Matt Mantei got five outs for his 20th save in 22 chances, his 13th in a row.

Minors:

Xavier Nady (7), Rico Washington (3) and Yamid Haad (10) all homered off Chris Wright in the second inning to power the Portland Beavers to a 5-0 victory over Tacoma.

Chattanooga beat Mobile in a shootout, 12-10. Roger Deago allowed three home runs in the game, but did not figure in the decision. HUMBERTO QUINTERO hit his second homer of the season and went 4-5 with 5 RBIs.

Fort Wayne beat Battle Creek 4-1. Darwin Soto got his ninth save of the year.

Idaho Falls got pummeled, losing 14-1 to Provo.

Denis Savage can be reached at [e-mail]