Luis Rengifo and Gavin Sheets hit back-to-back home runs and Casey Mize tossed six strong innings as the visiting San Diego Padres defeated the Cleveland Guardians 5-0 in the rubber match of a three-game series on Sunday.
Jase Bowen and Jake Cronenworth also slugged solo homers for San Diego, which claimed its third straight series victory and won for the 17th time in its last 22 games.
Mize (5-7) allowed three hits with one walk and three strikeouts in his third start since being acquired by San Diego from the Detroit Tigers.
Jeremiah Estrada, Adrian Morejon and Yuki Matsui each pitched a scoreless inning to seal the Padres’ ninth shutout of the season.
Jose Ramirez had two of Cleveland’s three hits. The Guardians have lost six of their last eight games and 17 of their last 23.
The start of the game was delayed by 3 hours, 11 minutes because of inclement weather.
San Diego claimed a 2-0 lead in the second inning against Tanner Bibee (4-13), who recorded two quick outs before Rengifo and Sheets homered.
Rengifo turned on a 3-1 sinker for his fourth home run of the season. Sheets followed with his 16th homer, a 367-foot shot to right field.
The Padres tacked on a run in the fourth inning. Jackson Merrill drew a leadoff walk, moved to second on Rengifo’s groundout and reached third on a wild pitch before scoring on Xander Bogaerts’ two-out single.
Bibee escaped a jam in the sixth inning when Freddy Fermin lined into a double play after Bogaerts drew a one-out walk to load the bases.
Bibee allowed three runs on seven hits over six innings. He walked three and struck out three.
The Padres added a run in the eighth inning on Bowen’s two-out homer against Tim Herrin. The 366-foot drive was Bowen’s second career homer.
Cronenworth capped the scoring in the eighth inning with his fourth homer of the season, a 403-foot blast to right-center field off Logan T. Allen.
