Parker Meadows cracked a grand slam with two outs in the top of the ninth inning Thursday night to lifting the visiting Detroit Tigers to a stunning 4-3 win over the San Diego Padres.
Detroit (71-70) avoided a three-game series sweep with a dramatic ninth inning rally against closer Robert Suarez (8-3). Justyn-Henry Malloy led off the inning with a single and Jace Jung walked. After Spencer Torkelson popped up, Colt Keith drew a walk to fill the bases.
Suarez fanned Kerry Carpenter for the second out but Meadows turned on a 3-2 fastball and ripped it 361 feet into the left field seats for his sixth homer of the year.
Ricky Vanasco (1-0) pitched the eighth inning for his first MLB win and Tyler Holton retired San Diego in the ninth to pick up his seventh save. The result allowed Detroit (71-70) to move within five games of idle Kansas City for the final American League wild-card spot.
Meanwhile, San Diego (80-62) missed on a chance to gain ground on the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League West. The Padres trail the Dodgers by five games but did stay a half-game ahead of Arizona, which lost in San Francisco, for the NL’s first wild-card position.
Casey Mize lasted 5 1/3 innings for Detroit, allowing six hits and three runs with a walk and two strikeouts. San Diego’s Martin Perez fired 6 1/3 shutout innings, permitting five hits and a walk while whiffing five.
San Diego took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first when Jurickson Profar slugged his 22nd homer 411 feet to the seats in right-center field, picking on a full-count fastball that was right down the middle.
Xander Bogaerts made it 3-0 in the second when he lined a hanging slider into the left field bleachers with Jake Cronenworth aboard after a leadoff double. It was Bogaerts’ eighth homer of the season.
Meadows and Andy Ibanez each picked up two hits for the Tigers, while Bogaerts had three of the Padres’ seven hits.