ARLINGTON, Texas — There is a game almost every tomorrow in baseball.
A no-hitter, no matter how historic, becomes a memory quickly when there are 154 games to play.
At least the Padres keep things interesting, especially when they play at Globe Life Field.
They ended three straight innings (and later another one) by grounding into double plays. They started two innings by hitting home runs. They took their first lead on another homer in the seventh inning and scored their final run when a ball went through the webbing of a glove.
They just don’t do things in a conventional manner when they come to play in Texas.
Sure, Saturday night’s 7-4 victory over the Rangers at Globe Life Field was a bit tame compared to the first no-hitter in franchise history, thrown by Joe Musgrove on Friday, or last August’s launch of Slam Diego.
But it took some doing for the Padres to not follow such a high with a lull.
Solo home runs by Eric Hosmer and Ha-seong Kim to start the fourth and fifth innings helped bring the Padres back from an early deficit, and Trent Grisham’s blast to right field after Kim had walked with one out in the seventh put them in front.
Kim’s grounder to shortstop appeared it would end the eighth inning with Jake Cronenworth stranded at third, but Isiah Kiner-Falefa’s throw passed through the webbing of first baseman Nate Lowe’s glove and trickled into foul territory as Kim crossed the base and Cronenworth ran home.
Chris Paddack allowed three runs in four innings for the second straight start. All three runs came in a span of four batters — on two doubles, a triple and a walk, in the second inning.
The Padres were doing everything right in the first few innings except scoring.
They were fouling off pitch after pitch, looking at balls, getting on base, driving Texas Rangers starter Jordan Lyles’ pitch count up and up and up.
Jurickson Profar singled on the ninth pitch he saw in first inning and popped out foul on the eighth pitch he saw in the third. Cronenworth walked on nine pitches in the second. The Padres loaded the bases before making an out in the third inning.
They were down 3-0 entering the fourth.
Suddenly, after five pitches, they were on the board and had runners at the corners. Eric Hosmer hit his third home run of the season on the first pitch Lyles threw in the inning, Wil Myers lined an 0-2 fastball to left field and Cronenworth grounded the next pitch into center field.
Myers scored on Tommy Pham’s sacrifice fly to right field to cut the lead to 3-2 before Luis Campusano’s 105.1-mph grounder was fielded by third baseman Anderson Tejada, who began the Rangers’ third inning-ending double play.
Kim’s first major league homer sliced into the left field foul pole to tie the game in the fifth.
Ryan Weathers relived Paddack and after getting the first out, left a 3-1 fastball in the middle of the strike zone that Kiner-Falefa lined into the left-field seats at 107.9 mph to put the Rangers back ahead.
Weathers had thrown 5 2/3 innings, including here in the National League Division Series last October, without allowing a run.
After an inning off from closing out play with a double play, Pham hit into his second one to end the sixth. It was the Padres’ major league-high 11th double play.
Keone Kela and Tim Hill combined to get through the seventh inning, Drew Pomeranz struck out all three batters he faced in the eighth and Mark Melancon pitched a perfect ninth for his fourth save.
