SAN DIEGO — The Padres completed a series sweep for just the second time in five tries this season by beating the Cardinals 5-3 on Sunday at Petco Park.
With their usual strong pitching, what has of late been excellent defense and some more help from the Cardinals, the Padres improved to 24-17. That is the second-best record in the National League, a distinction the Cardinals held when they arrived in San Diego.
With the three victories, the Padres also gained two games on the National League West-leading Giants, who won Sunday after losing to the Pirates on Friday and Saturday. The Giants’ lead is now a half-game.
Cardinals third baseman Nolan Arenado hit his third home run in three days to give the visitors a 2-0 lead in the first inning and then helped give the lead away in the fourth inning.
So too were Cardinals pitchers complicit once again in giving the Padres’ diminished lineup some assistance.
It was just Friday that five St. Louis pitchers issued 12 walks to help the Padres to a 5-4 victory.
What happened in Sunday’s fourth inning was not as ugly but just as startling.
After retiring the first eight batters he faced, Cardinals starter Kwang Hyun Kim yielded Ryan Weathers’ first major league hit on a grounder up the middle and then struck out Trent Grisham to end the third inning.
The Padres got two hits yet sent eight batters to the plate and scored four runs, three of them unearned, in the fourth inning.
It began with Manny Machado hitting a grounder toward the line that Arenado fielded well behind third base and then threw away as he tried to get a hustling Machado.
Machado was eliminated between first and second on Jake Cronenworth’s grounder to the right side and then Kim lost control.
He walked Tommy Pham and Austin Nola singled on a sinking line drive that fell just in front of Harrison Bader in center field. Pham had to hold up and was almost out at second, but Bader’s throw in pulled second baseman Tommy Edman off the bag.
With the bases loaded, walks by Tucupita Marcano and Ha-seong Kim tied the game and ended Kim’s day.
Patrick Kivlehan put the Padres up with a sacrifice fly to center field, and Ivan Castillo reached out to poke a two-strike curveball the other way down the right-field line for a single that scored Marcano and made it 4-2.
Weathers recovered from a 27-pitch first inning to make it through four innings in 69 pitches. He did not allow a hit after Tyler O’Neill’s double off the right-field wall in the first.
Grisham’s diving catch on Bader’s drive to center field ended the first inning to help Weathers strand runners at second and third.
Before the fifth inning began, Dinelson Lamet jogged in from the bullpen to make his first career relief appearance after 50 starts.
The right-hander, working back from an elbow issue that kept him out of the playoffs and delayed his start to this season, came in throwing harder than he had in his previous two starts and struck out two in a perfect fifth.
Paul Goldschmidt greeted him with a double to start the sixth and scored on Yadier Molina’s double-play grounder after having moved to third on Arenado’s infield single that went off Lamet’s glove. Marcano made a diving stop on Molina’s grounder to start the double play.
Lamet, whose spot was up third in the bottom of the sixth, was done after throwing a season-high 37 pitches.
Craig Stammen got the first two outs of the seventh inning before Dylan Carlson singled to left field. Asutin Adams came in and retired Goldschmidt on one pitch. Emilio Pagán pitched a perfect eighth, and Mark Melancon allowed one hit in a scoreless ninth to earn his major league-leading 14th save.
