NEW YORK — Ryan Weathers walked a tightrope, Manny Machado dropped a double on the foul line and Xander Bogaerts yanked a ball into the second deck of seats beyond left field.
All that provided a 4-2 victory over the Mets on Tuesday night that assured the Padres would finish their seven-game trip against two other National League pennant contenders with a winning record.
After taking three of four in Atlanta, the Padres can win this series with a victory in Wednesday’s finale.
Weathers allowed one run in five innings and got his first win since July 6, 2021.
Three relievers pitched a scoreless inning to get the game to closer Josh Hader, who allowed a run on two walks and a single but secured his fourth save.
Bogaerts’ add-on two-run homer in the top of the ninth was the difference.
Two batters at the bottom of the order — their backup catcher and a fill-in right fielder — got the Padres started in the fifth inning.
They had not done much against left-hander David Peterson, who had gotten a bunch of soft contact and allowed two hits while striking out five in the first four innings.
Luis Campusano, batting seventh, led off the fifth inning with a single lined to left field and went to second on Brandon Dixon’s one-out single grounded through the left side.
After Bogaerts grounded out to first base, moving both runners up, Machado pulled a soft liner down the line that actually came down on the line, bringing home both runners and stopping the Padres’ scoreless streak at 16 innings.
Campusano’s lead-off double, his third hit of the night, and Bogaerts’ two-out home run, his fourth of the season, made it 4-1 in the ninth.
The Mets had taken a 1-0 lead in the fourth inning on a pair of singles and a sacrifice fly. It could have been much worse.
But Weathers made an art of escaping trouble Tuesday.
His night began with a walk, a bunt single and a walk that loaded the bases with no outs in the bottom of the first.
He proceeded to strike out cleanup hitter Pete Alonso and get Mark Canha on a double play grounder.
Alonso was the first of eight consecutive batters Weathers set down.
He was at 59 pitches through three innings, which was a lot but also six fewer than he had thrown through three innings in his first start.
Weathers’ fourth pitch of the fourth inning was lined by Francisco Lindor into left field for a single. Alonso followed with a single, and when Lindor advanced to third on the hit Weathers again had to work with a runner at third and no outs.
He would not get out of this one unscathed, but it certainly could have been worse.
After Weathers’ fourth pitch to Mark Canha, Alonso was caught so badly by a pickoff throw that he was lucky he didn’t leave his uniform pants on the dirt. Canha followed with a sacrifice fly to bring in Lindor before Weathers ended the inning by getting a groundout by Jeff McNeil.
He finished his night by setting down the bottom three batters in the Mets lineup in order in the fifth, having thrown 89 pitches.
Brent Honeywell worked a perfect sixth against the top of the Mets order, and Luis Garcia allowed just a single by McNeil in the seventh.
Steven Wilson served as the bridge to Hader but made it interesting with a lead-off walk to No.8 hitter Eduardo Escobar and a one-out walk to Brandon Nimmo before getting a fielder’s choice grounder from Starling Marte and striking out Lindor.
