Christian Walker belted two homers and Joc Pederson hit one as the Arizona Diamondbacks notched a 6-0 victory over the Texas Rangers on Tuesday night at Phoenix.
Pavin Smith and Jose Herrera added RBI doubles for Arizona (81-64), which moved into a tie for the National League’s top wild-card spot, pending completion of the San Diego Padres’ game against the Seattle Mariners.
Walker had three RBIs for Arizona, which has won two straight games after losing eight of its previous 12.
Zac Gallen (12-6) allowed two hits in five scoreless innings for the Diamondbacks. He struck out seven and walked two.
Arizona’s Kevin Ginkel gave up a hit and issued a walk in the sixth, Ryan Thompson pitched a flawless seventh, A.J. Puk struck out the side in a perfect eighth and Justin Martinez struck out two in a 1-2-3 ninth.
Wyatt Langford had two of the Rangers’ three hits. Langford also stole two bases.
Texas (70-75) lost for just the fourth time in its past 14 contests. The Rangers are seven games behind the Twins for the American League’s third wild-card berth, and their playoff hopes are getting slimmer with four other teams residing between them and Minnesota in the standings.
Rangers starter Nathan Eovaldi (11-8) allowed four runs and seven hits over five innings. He struck out six and walked one.
Pederson and Walker hit back-to-back homers off Eovaldi in the first inning for Arizona.
Pederson ripped a 2-1 cutter over the pool in right-center for his 22nd home run of the season. Walker followed by taking an 0-1 fastball the opposite way to clear the right field fence.
In the third inning, Pederson walked with one out and Walker again went the opposite way, hitting a 2-1 slider over the fence in right to make it 4-0. It was his 25th homer of the season.
Arizona added another run in the eighth when Jake McCarthy led off with a bunt single and Smith followed with an RBI double into the right field corner. The hot-hitting Smith established single-game career bests of three homers and eight RBIs in the Diamondbacks’ previous game against the Houston Astros on Sunday.
Two outs later, Herrera drilled a ground-rule double over the fence in right-center to score Smith from third.