Jake Cronenworth’s first career five-hit game included a tiebreaking single in the seventh inning, helping the San Diego Padres rally from a three-run deficit to top the visiting Milwaukee Brewers 9-5 on Friday.
Cronenworth hit a full-count breaking ball from Hoby Milner (3-1) into left field to score pinch runner Jose Azocar to put San Diego on top 6-5. Donovan Solano added a bases-loaded walk and Milwaukee second baseman Brice Turang booted Ha-Seong Kim’s bouncer to cap a three-run outburst that decided the game.
Stephen Kolek (1-0) pitched 1 1/3 innings for his first major league win, and Enyel De Los Santos got the last five outs for his first save of the season. The Padres overcame sloppy defense — they committed four errors — with a 15-hit attack. Manny Machado added four hits, including a bloop RBI single in the eighth that scored Cronenworth from second.
The victory might prove costly for the Padres, though. Fernando Tatis Jr. exited two innings after he was hit in the left arm by a third-inning pitch. The team announced he sustained a left triceps contusion. Jurickson Profar came out in the seventh inning because of an apparent leg injury.
Neither starter was involved in the decision. Milwaukee’s Colin Rea lasted 5 1/3 innings, permitting six hits and five runs with two walks and no strikeouts. San Diego’s Dylan Cease threw 106 pitches in 4 2/3 innings, yielding six hits and four runs, walking two and striking out 10.
The Padres’ Jackson Merrill drove in the game’s first run with a fielder’s-choice grounder in the second. Cease made that run stand until the fifth, when the Brewers pieced together four runs.
Turang’s grounder to third scored Tyler Black after a long replay review determined Black touched the plate before being tagged. William Contreras and Christian Yelich followed with RBI singles, and Rhys Hoskins added a bases-loaded infield hit later in the inning off Tom Cosgrove.
Luis Arraez cut Milwaukee’s lead to 4-3 in the bottom of the fifth when he lined a two-run homer down the right field line, his second of the year. The Padres regained the lead in the sixth when Cronenworth cracked his 12th homer and Solano delivered a pinch-hit RBI single.
The Brewers tied the score in the seventh via Kim’s second throwing error of the game. Trying to turn a double play on Sal Frelick’s grounder, Kim bounced the throw wide of first, allowing Yelich to score from second.
–Field Level Media
