Kemp, Pomeranz lead Padres to 4-0 bounceback win vs Rockies
SAN DIEGO (AP) -- A night after their biggest collapse ever, the San Diego Padres got back to just playing baseball.
Matt Kemp hit a three-run home run estimated at 458 feet, matching the longest at Petco Park, Drew Pomeranz pitched seven innings of two-hit ball and Melvin Upton Jr. stole home as the Padres beat the Colorado Rockies 4-0 Friday night.
The Padres won a night after a bullpen meltdown so big that manager Andy Green called it "borderline inexplicable." The Padres blew a 12-2 lead to the Seattle Mariners, who scored 14 times in two innings to win 16-13. It was the biggest comeback in Mariners history and the biggest collapse in Padres history.
While Kemp's homer was impressive, the most exciting play was Upton's straight steal of home in the fourth.
With one out and Pomeranz batting, Upton got a great jump on lefty Chris Rusin and touched the plate with his left hand as his slide carried him just out of the reach of Nick Hundleys' tag.
"I knew he had a slow delivery to the plate out of the windup," Upton said. "I kind of extended my lead and when he didn't give me a peak I just took off."
Hundley "kind of gave me a reach and I don't know how I did but I got in under the tag."
Pomeranz said he saw Upton out of the corner of his eye and thought he was just showing a hard break to fake Rusin. Then he heard Upton yelling.
"So I just took a step back and let him do his thing," Pomeranz said. "He says that's what they do. They yell at you so you don't swing at it and kill them or something. I told him I'm glad he screamed because I probably would've swung at it and it wouldn't have been very good."
Upton went on his own.
"It's one of those plays that's incredibly smart when it works out," manager Andy Green said. "It was really well executed on his part and I'm happy Drew didn't swing."
Pomeranz (5-5) shut down the Rockies through seven, striking out eight and walking two. Ryan Buchter, part of Thursday night's collapse, pitched a perfect eighth and Carlos Villanueva pitched the ninth.
Kemp homered into the last row of the second deck in left field off Rusin (1-4) in the first. It matched a 458-foot homer hit by Adrian Gonzalez to right-center on April 26, 2009, when he was with the Padres.
"I've hit some pretty hard," Kemp said. "I don't really know how long all of them have gone. It feels good when you hit a ball like for sure."
It was Kemp's 14th. Jon Jay, coming off his first career five-hit game, hit a leadoff single and took third when Rusin fielded Wil Myers' comebacker and threw it into center field for an error ahead of Kemp's homer.
San Diego won for the third time in 12 games.
The Rockies lost their third straight game and for the sixth time in seven games.
After the first inning, third baseman Nolan Arenado came back into the dugout and was yelling in frustration.
"I can't repeat a lot of that," he said. "Just frustrated. Just losing gets kind of old. I wasn't yelling at Hundley, I was yelling in general. Just frustration got the best of me. If I was going to do that I probably should have done that in the tunnel. I got frustrated, I let it out. The boys know I love them. I wasn't yelling directly at anyone. Just losing is getting old."
Rusin allowed four runs -- three earned -- and four hits in seven innings.
TRAINER'S ROOM
Rockies: Hundley was reinstated from the 15-day disabled list (strained left oblique). C Tony Wolters was placed on the seven-day concussion disabled list.
UP NEXT
Rockies: RHP Chad Bettis (4-4, 5.46) is scheduled to start the middle game of the three-game series Saturday night. He beat the Padres 6-3 on April 10.
Padres: RHP Andrew Cashner (2-5, 4.79) is scheduled to start for the Padres.
TITLE TILT
Trevor Hoffman, a senior adviser to Padres general manager A.J. Preller, will have a gre at excuse for missing Saturday night's game. Hoffman will be across town watching sons Quinn and Wyatt playing for Cathedral Catholic against Eastlake in the CIF San Diego Section Open Division championship game at the University of San Diego's Fowler Park. Quinn Hoffman is a senior shortstop who will play at Harvard, and Wyatt is a junior second baseman. Eastlake, Gonzalez's alma mater, has four players who were on the Eastlake Little League team that reached the Little League World Series championship game in 2013 before losing to Japan.
