DENVER — Sunday was one of those days in the Rocky Mountains they put on postcards, so pretty and pleasant it makes a mile high seem like a delightful place to do just about anything.
Even play baseball.
Not that anyone would go that far. But it was the rare wonderful Colorado day for the Padres — and at a most important time.
They took a six-run lead, had the game get uncomfortable on them as games often do in the thin air and within the mammoth confines of Coors Field, and then pulled away with another big inning for a 13-6 victory over the Rockies.
The day was made even better with what happened in Cincinnati, where the Reds beat the Brewers. The two results trimmed the Padres’ magic number to six, meaning any combination of Padres victories and Brewers’ losses that add up to sixgets the Padres in the playoffs.
The Padres, who are off Monday before a three-game series against the Dodgers begins a nine-game homestand that closes out the regular season, said it would be different on this trip to Colorado.
And before leaving Coors Field behind for another year, the Padres left their Coors Field misery in the past.
In the ballpark where they had lost four consecutive series, they rebounded from a loss on Friday to win the next two days and for just the third time in 10 games here this season.
They did so Sunday with seven players getting at least two hits, tying a franchise record.
They scored three runs in the first inning and four in the third.
As the third inning was ending, with the Padres ahead 7-2, the Reds completed their 2-1 victory over the Brewers.
The Rockies scored twice more in the fourth and once in the fifth, their fourth consecutive inning with at least one run, to get to 7-5.
Pierce Johnson slowed the Rockies’ run with a scoreless sixth, but the Padres continued to languish at the plate.
They loaded the bases on a lead-off walk and pair of two-out walks in the fourth, got a two-out single from Ha-Seong Kim in the fifth and a two-out single from Luis Campusano in the seventh.
Then, after Robert Suarez pitched a perfect seventh, Kim led off the eighth with a double, Juan Soto singled and Manny Machado homered. Brandon Drury followed with a homer to make it 12-5.
The Padres’ biggest first inning in 23 games began with Kim’s leadoff double down the left-field line. And after Soto grounded out to Freeland, Machado’s flared single to right field moved Kim to third and Drury was hit on the foot by an 0-2 slider to load the bases.
They were not loaded for long. After Freeland’s third pitch to Jake Cronenworth, catcher Elias Diaz threw to third base to try to pick off Kim, and the ball got past third baseman Ryan McMahon and rolled into left field as all three runners moved up.
Cronenworth drove in Machado with a sacrifice fly, and Wil Myers drove in Drury with a double that bounced over the wall in center field.
In the second inning, a misplayed ball by Soto in right field led to a run and to Mike Clevinger throwing 14 pitches he could have saved for later.
Soto’s first step was in on a line drive by Diaz that should have been the third out. Soto immediately retreated, but the ball sailed over his head and Diaz had a double. San Diego State alumnus Alan Trejo then grounded a ball to the left side for an infield single that moved Diaz to third. A walk by Ezequiel Tovar loaded the bases.
The next batter, Cathedral High alumnus Sean Bouchard, hit an oddly spinning grounder off the end of his bat toward the hole on the right side that got the Rockies their first run and got the Padres the final out of the inning.
Cronenworth fielded the ball on the grass, spun and threw to catcher Campusano, as Trejo had rounded third and was halfway home. After a rundown between Campusano and Machado, Trejo was tagged out by Campusano.
Soto began a big third inning with a one-out single grounded into right field off the glove of diving first baseman C.J. Cron.
A Machado strikeout was followed by a double by Drury, a triple by Cronenworth and a home run by Myers in succession. Jurickson Profar and Luis Campusano followed with singles, but Freeland struck out José Azocar, and reliever Jake Bird ended the inning with a Kim fly ball.
It was 7-1.
Beginning with McMahon’s homer in the bottom of the third, the Rockies began chipping away.
Clevinger would end up being charged with five runs and did not get the decision, as he was pulled after Yonathan Daza’s lead-off double in the fifth. Daza scored on Charlie Blackmon’s single off Steven Wilson. The Rockies would not score again until a Blackmon double and Diaz single got them a run in the eighth against Nick Martinez.
The Padres added a run in the ninth on two walks, a wild pitch and a groundout.
