It took a lot longer than they wanted, but the Padres ensured themselves at least a split of their 4-game series in Arizona with a crazy, 6-4, 12-inning win over the Diamondbacks on Saturday night. The game had more surprise twists than an M. Night Shyamalan film (I mean, of course, the early stuff like The Sixth Sense, not the later stuff like After Earth).
Padres starting pitcher Tyson Ross threw well enough to snap his career-long 3-game losing streak, but ended up with a no-decision. Ross went 6.0 innings, striking out six and allowing two earned runs. Well, he should only be on the hook for one earned run.
In the 4th inning David Peralta hit a sinking liner to left field. It landed a few feet in front of Justin Upton, but for some reason the left fielder still tried to slide and make a play. It was unsuccessful. The ball skipped by all the way to the wall and allowed Paul Goldschmidt to score from first base.
Ross left trailing 2-1, but in the 8th inning the Padres helped him out. Diamondbacks manager sent left-handed pitcher and former Padre Oliver Perez to face the left-handed hitting Cory Spangenberg. Padres manager Bud Black countered by sending in Jedd Gyorko to pinch-hit. Jedd ripped a double to left-centerfield and scored the tying run on a Yangervis Solarte double. Solarte scored on a double by Derek Norris and the Friars were in control.
They scored another in the top of the 9th, setting up Craig Kimbrel to get his 10th save. But, that did not happen. Kimbrel walked Jordan Pacheco with two outs, allowed a single to Aaron Hill, then got touched up by Danny Dorn. The 30-year-old rookie roped a 2-run double, the first RBI of his big league career, and the game was ticketed for extra innings.
It looked like the D-Backs would win it in the 10th. The first two runners reached against Brandon Maurer. That’s when the San Diego defense came up large. Peralta thought he had a single up the middle but shortstop Alexi Amarista made a diving stop on the bag to get an out. With runners at the corners and one out Cliff Pennington hit a liner towards right but Gyorko, with the infield in, dove to his left to snare it and double off the runner at first base.
In the 12th, the Arizona bullpen blinked. Justin Upton made up for his defensive lapse with a solo home run to left-center, his 8th of the season, to put the Padres up 5-4. They got one more on an Amarista RBI single but would not need it.
Kevin Quackenbush, who played the role of the closer for a time in 2014, threw the 11th and 12th innings to get his first win of the season.
The Padres improve to 17-15 on the year and can win the 4-game set on Sunday when Andrew Cashner takes the mound.
