SAN DIEGO — It’s alive.
The San Diego Padres’ offense breathed. Then it kicked.
Then it ran all the way home.
Adam Frazier scored from third base Saturday when a pitch from Philadelphia Phillies reliever Connor Brogdon bounced well in front of the plate and skipped past catcher Andrew Knapp to give the Padres a 4-3 win and prevent them from falling out of playoff position for the first time in exactly four months.
Wil Myers began the inning on second and went to third on Adam Frazier’s single. Myers was caught in a rundown on Ha-seong Kim’s grounder. With Frazier on third and Kim on second, Trent Grisham came to the plate and was down 1-2 when Brogdon bounced the fateful change-up.
Mark Melancon got the win by pitching the final two innings.
Down 1-0 from the game’s second pitch and with the Cincinnati Reds having won earlier in the day, the Padres were going to need to score to remain a contender.
They will need to continue to win over the next six weeks if they have any hope of showing last year’s 60-game run to the postseason was not a fluke and preventing this season from being a failure.
It was Jake Cronenworth who provided the punch that prolonged what would become the Padres’ first victory in five games and second in their past 10.
He sent the 117th pitch from Phillies starter Aaron Nola to the party deck beyond right-center field to tie the game.
Nola was seeking the second nine-inning complete game of his career and of the season.
He was an out away when Cronenworth drove a 3-1 sinker an estimated 410 feet — and just inches beyond the glove of Phillies center fielder Travis Jankowski, the former Padre who had leaped well above the wall.
The Padres’ first order of business in the comeback was putting someone on base against Nola, who was perfect through six innings in front of 43,383 at Petco Park.
Grisham, leading off the seventh inning, achieved that aim when Phillies first baseman Brad Miller tried to backhand a chopper only to have it go off his glove and roll into right field.
The third-largest crowd of the season finally got loud.
And the Padres finally got a hit in a game started by Joe Musgrove. And that hit drove in a run.
Grisham stole second base during Fernando Tatis Jr.’s strikeout before Manny Machado lined the first pitch he saw in the inning into center field to tie the game 1-1.
After Cronenworth flied out, Padres catcher Austin Nola walked against his younger brother before Eric Hosmer struck out to end the inning.
The tie didn’t last long.
Aaron Nola led off the eighth with a double to right-center field off Daniel Hudson, who had pitched a perfect seventh in relief of Musgrove.
Tim Hill replaced Hudson, and Nola moved to third on a sacrifice bunt by Odubel Herrera before Hill walked Jean Segura and Bryce Harper to load the bases. Hill’s next pitch hit left-handed hitting Didi Gregorius above his right elbow.
Austin Adams entered the game and struck out Andrew McCutchen before forcing in another run by hitting Miller. Ronald Torreyes struck out to end the inning.
Nola got through a 1-2-3 eighth inning in just 12 pitches. It was the sixth time he completed an inning in a dozen or fewer pitches. He began the ninth with his 11th strikeout, setting down Grisham. Tatis followed with a walk before Machado lined out and Cronenworth tied it up.
As the Padres worked on rediscovering their offense, the Cincinnati Reds were enjoying a temporary stay ahead of them in the National League standings. Their victory over the Marlins on Saturday put them a half-game up on the Padres in the race for NL’s final wild-card spot. The Padres pulled back into a tie with the victory.
April 21 was the last time the Padres were not in possession of a playoff spot, either in first place in the NL West (for nine straight days near the end of May) or as a wild card.
A loss Friday coupled with a Reds’ victory had the Padres no longer needing to look over their shoulders.
Nola had them simply looking bad.
He struck out seven in a row between the second and fourth innings and allowed one ball out of the infield before Machado’s single.
This, exactly one week after the Padres were no-hit by Arizona Diamondbacks rookie Tyler Gilbert, a game also started by Musgrove.
Where a week ago in Arizona, Musgrove allowed five runs in the first inning, making the result seem inevitable almost from the start what has for a while been a largely punchless Padres team, Musgrove did a quick U-turn Saturday en route to his fifth quality start in his past six games.
Herrera hit a home run on the game’s second pitch. Musgrove’s 1-2 curveball hit Segura. Harper followed with a single.
Musgrove retired the next eight batters he faced before Harper singled with two outs in the third. That was the only hit Musgrove gave up the rest of the way. He walked successive batters with two out in the fourth before getting a groundout.
His final out in the sixth was his ninth strikeout of the game, achieved with his 99th pitch.
Musgrove was the first Padres starting pitcher to go six innings in 11 games. The rotation’s ERA, not counting the three games started by relievers, was 9.40 in its previous seven starts.
Yu Darvish (back), Chris Paddack (oblique) and Jake Arrieta (hamstring) are on the injured list. That leaves Musgrove, Snell and Weathers as the only healthy starters. And manager Jayce Tingler would not commit to Weathers, who has allowed 25 runs in his past four starts, remaining in the rotation when asked Saturday afternoon.
That’s a problem.
But so is the offense scoring 29 runs in the nine games leading up to Saturday, which includes being shut out twice and scoring three or fewer runs four other times.
The Padres went 1-8 in those games, losing all of what was on Aug. 10 a 41/2-game lead over the Reds.
The Padres are 9-15 since July 24, a day they began with a 61/2-game lead over the Reds in the wild-card standings.
Darvish is expected back as soon as Tuesday for the start of a series against the Dodgers. The Padres believe Paddack and Arrieta can be back in the final week of August.
It will hardly matter if the offense can’t score more.
