SAN DIEGO — Suddenly, Petco Park is struggling to hold baseballs.
The Padres hit three home runs for a second straight game for the first time this season and held off the Diamondbacks, who also hit three home runs, for a 6-3 victory Wednesday night.
It was, in fact, the second consecutive night both teams hit three homers apiece.
Yu Darvish was the second straight Padres starting pitcher to surrender three home runs. It was just the 12th time in 238 career starts Darvish allowed that many homers.
But, unlike Joe Musgrove a night earlier, Darvish limited the damage to the three solo shots and worked into the seventh inning.
The victory moved the Padres to four games up on the Brewers in the race for the final National League playoff spot, as Milwaukee lost to the Rockies on Wednesday. The lead is essentially akin to five games since the Padres hold the tiebreaker over the Brewers.
There was potential bad news for the Padres.
On the night a T-shirt replica of his City Connect jersey was given way, Juan Soto departed an inning after being hit squarely in the back by a 91-mph fastball from Tommy Henry. Soto fell to the ground and sat there for a full minute in obvious pain before taking first base. He played right field in the top of the fourth but was replaced in the lineup by Trent Grisham in the top of the fifth. Grisham played center field, and José Azocar moved from there to right.
In the bottom of the fifth, Grisham scored the first run of the game that wasn’t driven in by a homer — reaching on a single, stealing second and scoring on Josh Bell’s single to make it 5-3.
To that point, all seven runs had come via balls going over walls.
In fact, the games’ first six hits were homers — three for each team, including Arizona rookie Corbin Carroll’s first career homer and the 150th of Wil Myers’s career, as well as the first career multi-homer game by Daulton Varsho.
Carroll’s was the second of back-to-back blasts in the second inning, the first by Varsho. Varsho also tied the game 3-3 with a homer in the fourth inning.
The Padres had tied the game 2-2 in the bottom of the second on Bell’s walk and Jurickson Profar’s two-run homer, and they took a 3-2 lead two batters later when Jake Cronenworth homered for the second night in a row.
Myers’ home run in the fourth made it 4-3.
Petco Park was not quite the home run desert its reputation suggested. It was allowing 1.9 home runs a game before the homerpalooza of the past two days. That made it among the 10 stingiest venues in the major leagues, but it was almost half a homer per game from the bottom.
It is now up over two homers a game.
The Padres added a run in the eighth when Austin Nola singled moved to second on a groundout and scored on Ha-Seong Kim’s double.
It didn’t get worse for Darvish because of two double plays and a rare instance of a Padres catcher throwing out a would-be base stealer.
Alek Thomas led off the fifth inning with a single to the gap in right field and raced to second when Azocar bobbled the ball. Thomas moved to third on a sacrifice bunt before Darvish walked Josh Rojas.
Ketel Marte then grounded a ball sharply to Myers at first base. He threw a little high to second, where shortsop Ha-Seong Kim made the force out and fired back essentially flat-footed to Myers just in time to get Marte.
After Darvish had completed six innings for the 19 straight start and the 24th time 26 starts, tied for most in the majors, he went out to start the seventh.
Carroll led off by rapping a double to the corner in right field. After Darvish walked Cooper Hummel, Bob Melvin went to right-hander Robert Suarez.
On Suarez’s fifth pitch to his first batter, Thomas, Carroll took off for third base and was thrown out by Nola. It was just the eighth time this season a Padres catcher threw out a runner attempting to steal. Their 9% rate of doing so is lowest in the major leagues.
Suarez then walked Thomas before Geraldo Perdomo grounded a ball up the middle that Cronenworth fielded near second base before stepping on the bag and throwing to Myers to end the inning.
Nick Martinez worked a scoreless eighth, and Josh Hader a perfect ninth for his second save with the Padres and 31st of the season.
