Arizona jumps Young early

By: DAN HAYES - Staff Writer | Friday, August 31, 2007 12:26 AM PDT ∞

SAN DIEGO---- Arizona has played with resilience all year, so it should come as no surprise that on a night when Padres pitcher Chris Young wasn't his normal self, the Diamondbacks took advantage.

In doing so, Arizona avoided a four-game sweep by jumping out to an eight-run lead and then holding on for an 8-7 win over the Padres in front of 28,554 at Petco Park on Thursday night.

Jose Valverde gave up a ninth-inning home run to Milton Bradley, but struck out the side to earn his 41st save. The win helped the Diamondbacks retain a one-game lead over the Padres in the National League West. The Wild Card-leading Padres also lost ground to Philadelphia, an 11-10 winner over New York.

"The win didn't come the way we would have liked considering how the game started," Arizona manager Bob Melvin said. "But a win's a win. That's all that really matters."

What mattered to Young, who missed his previous start with an ailing back, was the life on his fastball, and that he didn't feel sore on the mound.

But from the minute Young (9-5) stepped on the field, he looked out of sorts and was uncharacteristically wild.

The tall Texan missed often with his fastball and left after 4 1/ 3 innings as he tied his career worst with six bases on balls.

He escaped several early jams but Young's control issues caught up with him in the fifth.

Already trailing 2-0, he walked Orlando Hudson, hit Eric Byrnes and walked Tony Clark to load the bases with one out. Joe Thatcher walked in Stephen Drew to make it 3-0 before Mark Reynolds had a three-run double off Cla Meredith to give Arizona a 6-0 advantage.

"I was rusty," said Young, who reported some stiffness after the game. "I dug us in a hole and had too much to overcome. But I'll iron out the wrinkles and be ready to go. I was able to turn the ball loose and it had better life than it's had in a month."

Reynolds' three-run hit gave the Diamondbacks life in this series and also capped a career best five-RBI night. He earlier blasted a 451-foot homer off Young with Drew aboard. The second-inning homer was the first off Young here since Pittsburgh's Joe Randa broke up a no-hit bid in the ninth inning of a Sept. 22, 2006 contest ---- a string of 69 innings.

But Reynolds, who struck out nine straight times last week, was equally as happy with the at-bat against Meredith when he fouled off four consecutive 1-2 pitches before doubling.

"I was just trying to stay with him and put something in the gap," Reynolds said. "It ended up producing some pretty big runs for us."

Said Black: "That was big. He fouled off good pitches. Cla kept going at him and Reynolds kept fighting."

Stymied by Doug Davis (12-11) for six innings, the Padres kept fighting until the left-hander was removed with two outs in the seventh.

But Davis, who entered with an average of 4.60 walks issued per nine innings, only walked two and kept the Padres at bay until Arizona had an 8-0 advantage.

But they knocked him out with three runs in the seventh and got three more in the eighth inning off Juan Cruz and Tony Pena with RBI singles by Kevin Kouzmanoff, Josh Bard and Craig Stansberry. The Padres had the tying runners on second and third, but Doug Slaten got Brian Giles to pop out to shallow right with an 8-6 lead intact.

"The guys kept getting on," Black said. "We battled against a pretty good bullpen. ... It would have been nice to get this one."

Contact staff writer Dan Hayes at dhayes@nctimes.com.