PHOENIX — Sean Manaea was back and better.
For the second time in 10 days, however, the San Diego Padres were no match for a Diamondbacks pitcher making his major league debut.
In his return to the starting rotation, Manaea allowed three hits in five innings, but two of them were home runs, and the Padres lost 4-0 on Thursday night at Chase Field.
Drey Jameson, a 25-year-old right-hander who had a 6.95 ERA in Triple-A, allowed just two hits as he became the second straight Diamondbacks starter to throw seven shutout innings against the Padres while pitching for the first time in the big leagues.
In his first at-bat off the concussion injured list, Brandon Drury grounded a single up the middle with one out in the second inning. That moved Josh Bell, who had walked, to second base. The next two batters struck out. Drury led off the fifth inning with a double to left field but was there when the inning ended after three outs Jameson recorded on nine pitches.
Those failures in five at-bats with runners in scoring position made the Padres 11-for-75 (.147) with runners in scoring position over their past 12 games.
The loss meant the Padres’ lead over the idle Milwaukee Brewers in the race for the final National League playoff spot was diminished to 11/2 games.
Through three innings Thursday, Ketel Marte was the only Diamondbacks batter with a hit. Manaea was throwing harder and throwing strikes to all parts of the zone.
Marte also got Arizona’s second hit, a home run he launched an estimated 423 feet to center field on the first pitch of the fourth inning. Emmanuel Rivera’s skied fly ball that landed in the Diamondbacks’ bullpen with two outs in the fourth inning made it 2-0.
Manaea was lifted for Robert Suarez after five innings. Suarez pitched a scoreless sixth inning before Carson Kelly homered off Nick Martinez in the seventh to make it 3-0.
Considering what he did and what he had done much of the previous month-plus, Thursday’s start had to be considered a successful return for Manaea.
Pitching from the stretch, with the idea he would be able hide the ball from batters longer, he threw 53 strikes among his 76 pitches. His sinker reached 96 mph twice in the first inning and still near 93 in the third before dropping precipitously over the final three innings.
Manaea had been removed from the rotation for a turn after his Sept. 3 start in Los Angeles, during which the Dodgers scored eight runs on nine hits in 4 1/3 innings. It was the second consecutive start in which he did not last five innings while allowing at least nine hits and six runs.
The big left-hander has 15 quality starts, but only one of those came in his past six starts. In that span, he had a 9.21 ERA over 28 1/3 innings.
His being able to capably fill starts for the Padres over the final three weeks of the season is seen as important. But it is not as imperative as the offense being more proficient.
There are many ways to illustrate the deficiencies, but Thursday provided another confounding example of their overall ineptness.
In the two recent games against Diamondbacks pitchers making their big-league debut — against Ryne Nelson on Sept. 5 and Jameson on Thursday — the Padres totaled six hits and failed to score in 14 innings.
Nelson and Jameson are the only pitchers to throw seven scoreless innings in their major league debuts this season, which makes the Padres the only team to have it done to them.
Facing Kevin Ginkel (El Capitan High, Southwestern College), Ha-Seong Kim led off the eighth inning with an infield single chopped high off the plate but was stranded there after three straight outs.
The Diamondbacks scored a run in the bottom of the eighth inning. Steven Wilson hit lead-off batter Stone Garrett and allowed a one-out single to Jake McCarthy before being replaced by Luis Garcia, who surrendered a run-scoring single by Christian Walker before ending the inning.
Juan Soto, Manny Machado and Jake Cronenworth went down in order in the ninth. Soto is now 3-for-48 over the past 14 games.
