Manny Machado's home run lifts Padres past Braves, helps end losing streak

Kevin Acee, The San Diego Union-Tribune on May 24, 2025

Published in Baseball

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ATLANTA — The Padres ran into Chris Sale and ran into Ronald Acuña Jr.

And then Manny Machado ran into one.

And the Padres won.

The erstwhile slugger’s first home run in 63 at-bats was the difference on Friday night in a 2-1 victory over the Braves that stopped a losing streak at six games.

“Thank God,” Machado recalled thinking as he watched his 422-foot blast fly.

Machado’s fourth homer of 2025, tied for the fewest he has ever had 49 games into a season, came off Raisel Iglesias in the top of the ninth inning. It sailed to the second deck of seats beyond left field, and it ended a week’s worth of losing and maybe a week’s worth of futility.

“We’ve been shaking off the feeling of the heaviness, and I think fairly well,” manager Mike Shildt said. “We keep going, keep going, keep going. You want to see some breakthrough and get some breaks and make your own. We’ve broken through. And now it’s time to get back to the good side of (win) column.”

Robert Suarez earned his 16th save — and first since May 5 — by working a wild ninth inning that featured an almost inexplicable gaffe on the basepaths by Braves pinch-runner Eli White, who was thrown out returning to second base on a single by Ozzie Albies.

“I just got confused for whatever reason when I saw (third base coach Matt Tuiasosopo) throw his hands up,” White said. It was just a terrible mistake in a big situation, so it’s just a tough one to swallow.”

He was out when first baseman Luis Arraez cut off center fielder Jackson Merrill’s throw home and threw to shortstop Xander Bogaerts at second base.

Instead of the Braves having runners at the corners with one out, they had a runner at first base with two outs. Suarez got a groundout by Michael Harris II to end the game.

It completed a night full of strong defense and excellent pitching if not a true emergence by the Padres offense.

Nick Pivetta threw six innings that could best be described as gritty.

“That was next-level, John Wayne gritty,” manager Mike Shildt said.

The right-hander moved on from Acuña’s stadium-rattling home run on the first pitch he threw and the first pitch Acuña has seen in over a year while recovering from ACL surgery.

Pivetta was not as sharp as in his previous quality starts, falling behind far more often and having to work around multiple base runners in the first and third innings. But he did not allow another run while throwing a season-high 102 pitches.

Adrián Morejón worked 1 2/3 scoreless innings before Jason Adam got the final out of the eighth.

“Important series for us,” Pivetta said. “Just the way things were going. There was a lot of fight in the clubhouse, obviously shown today, but just trying to go as deep as I can in the baseball game, take as much effort off the relievers as I possibly can. Luckily, Morejón and Jason and Bob came in tonight, and they shut the door and they did an incredible job.”

Speaking of which, Sale was Sale.

“Today,” Machado said, “he was the best I’ve ever seen him pitch.”

Facing the left-hander, who last year won the National League Cy Young Award, can be a run through the mud even for an offense that has been speeding along.

For the Padres sluggish offense, which entered the game having been held to one or zero runs five times and batting .201 over the course of a six-game losing streak, it figured to be like running backward uphill in the dark in the mud.

And it largely was.

Gavin Sheets answered Acuña’s homer by blasting a fastball from Sale over the wall in left-center field in the second inning. Sheets’ third home run in two games was one of four hits the Padres got off Sale in seven innings.

One of those hits was a double by Fernando Tatis Jr. leading off the sixth inning. He moved to third on a bunt by Arraez but was thrown out trying to score on a grounder by Machado.

With one out in the eighth inning, Elias Díaz lined a ball down the right-field line against Daysbel Hernandez and tried to stretch it into a double against the notoriously strong-armed Acuña, who fired a strike to second base for the out.

After Machado led off the ninth with a home run, Alex Verdugo led off the bottom of the inning with a single before being replaced at first base by White.

White moved to second when Sean Murphy dribbled a ball down the third base line that stayed fair. Díaz sprang from behind the plate, picked up the ball on the line with his back to first base, spun and threw out Murphy by a step.

“I’ve got to make that play,” Díaz said. “… We’ve been battling. We went through a losing streak. Everybody wants to win. Pivetta performed well. He gave us a chance to score one more run than the other team and get the ‘W’.”