On the final day of a dismal trip, the Padres found a new but familiar way to lose.
This one was a little different than so many of the losses in what is now going on three weeks of bad baseball by what was previously a good team. The Padres got hits Wednesday. They even slugged.
But home runs by Fernando Tatis Jr., Trent Grisham and Jake Cronenworth were not enough.
Every time the Padres came back, the heretofore pathetic Colorado Rockies added on and completed a three-game sweep with an 8-7 victory ended on pinch-hitter Charlie Blackmon’s walk-off single in the ninth inning. (box score.)
Trevor Story began the bottom of the ninth with a walk, stole second and scored easily on Blackmon’s hit up the middle off Austin Adams.
That left the Padres 1-5 on a trek that took them to New York before arriving a mile high to get beat in the heat by a team that was 16 games under .500 at the start of the series. The Padres have lost 13 of their past 17 games.
Padres starting pitcher Blake Snell tied a career high by allowed seven runs, which was familiar. Wednesday was the fourth time in his 15 starts he did not make it out of the fourth inning and the eighth time he didn’t make it to the fifth.
The Rockies took a 3-0 lead in a first inning that did perfectly fit into the type of baseball the Padres are playing of late.
Tommy Pham, their only batter with an average above .300 over the past 17 games, began the game by grounding a single to left field. On a fly ball out to center field by Fernando Tatis Jr., Pham tagged up and ran to second.
That’s the aggressive manner in which the Padres play. And it seemed to work. Pham beat the throw and was called safe. But he clearly had come off the bag momentarily as he slid past the base, and he was called out after a video review.
With two outs, Manny Machado walked and Wil Myers singled before Trent Grisham’s grounder to first base ended the inning.
Rockies leadoff hitter Raimel Tapia began the bottom of the first by grounding a ball down just inside third base and rounded first trying to stretch his hit into a double. Pham had gotten to the ball quickly and appeared to have a good chance for the out, but his throw sailed high. Tapia moved to third on a bunt and scored on Story’s double under diving first baseman Jurickson Profar. The next batter, C.J. Cron, hit the 10th pitch he saw from Snell, a curveball, to the bleachers beyond left field.
The Padres scored three runs in the third inning on Tatis’ 21st home run of the season, a single by Machado and two-run homer by Grisham.
Two singles and a fly ball were enough for the Rockies to take the lead in the bottom of the third before back-to-back RBI doubles by Tatis and Machado gave the Padres their first lead, 5-4, in the fourth. Machado was thrown out at home to end that inning, as he was sent from second on Trent Grisham’s single.
Elias Díaz tied the game on the second pitch in the bottom of the fourth. Snell struck out pitcher Yency Almonte and then gave up a double, single and double in succession as the Rockies went up 7-5.
Snell was replaced by James Norwood, who was recalled from Triple-A on Wednesday. The right-hander got two quick outs. Nabil Crismatt followed with two scoreless innings, Craig Stammen pitched a perfect seventh, and Pierce Johnson a scoreless eighth.
The Padres’ only hit over the final five innings was Cronenworth’s sixth-inning homer.
But the Rockies finally acting like the Rockies helped the Padres tie the game without getting a hit in the ninth.
Pham and Tatis drew walks from Carlos Estevez to start the ninth inning before Machado flied out to left field. Wil Myers followed by hitting a grounder to second baseman Brendan Rodgers that may have been a game-ending double play had Rodgers not thrown the ball past Story, who was covering second.
With the bases loaded, Grisham’s sacrifice fly made it 7-7.
