A fractured finger delayed the start of Austin Nola’s season until late April. A left knee sprain sidelined him for another two months. If there’s a silver lining in all that lost time, perhaps it’s this:
Nola just might have fresh legs under him as the rest of the Padres trudge through the so-called dog days of summer.
The 31-year-old catcher’s two-hit game extended his hitting streak to a career-high nine games, with the second driving in the go-ahead run in a 6-5 victory over the Marlins on Tuesday night as the Padres pushed their winning streak to four games.
“I don’t know about fresher, but I’ll say healthier,” Padres manager Jayce Tingler said of Nola. “He’s got a lot of confidence in the knee, the range of motion, the strength, all those things. I think he’s starting to get stronger and healthier, and then just with his rhythm and timing and starting to get all the game at-bats and reps behind the plate — I don’t know about fresher, but I do think he’s feeling good and strong.”
Clearly.
Nola is 14-for-27 (.519) with four doubles and nine RBIs during his streak, lifting his OPS from .647 on July 24 to .824 after his second hit scored Adam Frazier in the seventh inning.
His first hit Tuesday was a double that rolled to the wall in left-center, following back-to-back two-out doubles from Manny Machado and Jake Cronenworth, to shave the Padres’ deficit to 3-2 after Craig Stammen stumbled out of the gate to start a bullpen game.
“He hits a lot of line drives up the middle,” Tingler said, “and I think when he’s going well he can really fill the left-center gap really well. He uses the whole field, a lot of barrels, a lot of low line drives.”
After Stammen allowed four runs over two innings, it was clear things would not go the way the Padres drew up the bullpen game.
Their confidence in a unit with an MLB-best 2.90 ERA remained.
Miguel Diaz followed Stammen with two shutout innings. Tim Hill and Austin Adams each fired a scoreless inning. Pierce Johnson helped Matt Strahm out of the seventh after he allowed Miguel Rojas’ game-tying double. And Mark Melancon was called on for a four-out save after Drew Pomeranz walked off the mound in the eighth with a trainer.
Melancon was up for the challenge, striking out Jorge Alfaro on three pitches to end the eighth and surviving Sandy Leon’s leadoff double in the ninth to convert his MLB-leading 34th save.
Wil Myers reached base four times — twice on singles and twice on walks — and scored the Padres’ first go-ahead run on Tommy Pham’s infield single in the fourth.
Eric Hosmer and Trent Grisham also collected two hits as every starter reached base at least once in erasing an early 3-0 deficit.
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