ATLANTA — Michael Wacha and three relievers were good enough Saturday night that the Padres didn’t need the run Rougned Odor didn’t score nor the one that he did score.
Wacha struck out 10 batters over six scoreless innings to get the Padres on their way to a fairly straightforward but also sort of wacky 4-1 victory over the Braves on Saturday night at Truist Park.
Steven Wilson, Luis Garcia and Josh Hader finished off the Padres’ second consecutive win.
Wacha, a 31-year-old right-hander signed in February with the hope he would essentially be an innings eater, allowed two hits and walked a batter while tying his career high for strikeouts. He has gone six innings in both his starts.
On a chilly night that followed a day of rain, the Padres took an early lead on Juan Soto’s 428-foot home run in the third inning.
They added two runs that at first appeared to be three in the fourth inning.
Jake Cronenworth led off the fourth with a single lined into right field after ricocheting off the glove of Braves first baseman Matt Olson. With one out and Odor at the plate, Cronenworth stole second and went to third when catcher Travis d’Arnaud’s throw sailed into center field.
Odor grounded the next pitch to second baseman Ozzie Albies, who threw home, not quite in time to beat Cronenworth’s feet-first slide.
Another fielder’s choice grounder a few minutes later would cause some confusion.
After Ha-Seong Kim lined a double to left field that moved Odor to third, Trent Grisham hit a ball on the ground to Olson, who fired home wide of the plate. That forced d’Arnaud to reach into the batter’s box on the first base side. He failed to come up with the ball before turning back across the plate to try to tag Odor, who raced past standing up. In the process of running over d’Arnaud, Odor missed the plate.
As the ball bounced to the back wall, Kim ran home to score. Seconds later, Odor walked back to touch the plate.
The scoreboard read 4-0 as Braves manager Brian Snitker came out to talk with home plate umpire Chad Fairchild. After a minute, Fairchild returned to near home plate and Braves pitcher Charlie Morton threw to d’Arnaud to appeal the play, and Fairchild ruled that Odor was out.
According to an official scorer in the press box, Odor was assumed by rule to have scored when he crossed home plate, so his going back to touch the plate did not matter after Kim scored.
That made the score 3-0. The Padres added on in the ninth when a wild pitch by Kirby Yates allowed Odor, who had doubled and moved to third on Grisham’s single.
Wacha, who retired 10 straight to start the game, allowed a one-out double in the fourth and a two-out single in the sixth. His walk came with two outs in the fifth.
Wacha going as deep as he did — the first Padres starter in five games to last longer than five innings — set up the ideal Wilson to Garcia bridge to Hader.
Wilson worked a scoreless seventh. With a bit of bad luck, Garcia allowed a run in the eighth.
A one-out grounder by No. 9 hitter Sam Hilliard was headed toward Kim when it bounced off the second base bag and into center field as Hilliard raced to second.
After Ronald Acuna Jr. flied out to left field, Matt Olson’s single drove in Hilliard. That’s when Garcia got some payback in the form of having Manny Machado as his third baseman.
Austin Riley hit a hard grounder to the hole on the left side that Machado speared with a dive and threw to second to force Olson.
Hader issued a walk and yielded a flared single to left before striking out the next three batters to finish off his second save in two nights and third of the season.
