Charlie Blackmon and Kyle Freeland continued their domination of the Padres Friday night, leading the Colorado Rockies to a 4-1 victory in San Diego.
Left-hander Freeland shut out the Padres on three hits and a walk with one strikeout over six innings to earn the win. It was Freeland’s seventh career win against the Padres. Since the start of the 2022 season, Freeland is 3-0 with a 2.04 earned run average at Petco Park.
Blackmon hit a two-run homer and scored twice Friday night. It was the 34th career homer by Blackmon against the Padres. He has a .311 career batting average and 98 RBIs against San Diego.
The Rockies have outscored the Padres 11-3 and outhit San Diego 25-12 while winning two straight games to open the season.
For the second straight night, the Rockies scored in the top of the first.
Kris Bryant and Blackmon had one-out singles and C.J. Cron drew a walk from Padres starter Nick Martinez to load the bases. Ryan McMahon then hit a sharp grounder to third. Manny Machado threw to Xander Bogaerts covering second to get the force, but the shortstop dropped the ball on the possible double-play transfer allowing Bryant to score. Elehuris Montero then singled home Blackmon to make it 2-0.
Ezequiel Tovar singled off Martinez to open the Rockies fifth and came around on Blackmon’s first homer of the season.
Martinez gave up four runs on six hits and two walks in seven innings to take the loss. He also had five strikeouts.
Ha-Seong Kim had three of the Padres’ five hits and scored the Padres’ lone run in the bottom of the eighth. After doubling in each of his first two plate appearances, Kim singled to open the eighth against former Padres reliever Brad Hand. He advanced to second on Trent Grisham’s walk, reached third on a sacrifice bunt and scored on a sacrifice fly by Bogaerts.
Pierce Johnson, another former Padres’ reliever, worked a hitless ninth to pick up his first career save in his 141st career appearance.
The Rockies are now 12-9 against the Padres since the start of the 2022 season.
–Field Level Media
