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Cook powers Rockies past struggling Padres

May 10, 2008 - 6:03 AM By Tim Powers PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

SAN DIEGO (Ticker) -- Aaron Cook rode a personal streak one way, while his opponent continued to slide in the other direction.

Cook won his sixth straight decision and Brad Hawpe drove in a pair of runs to lead the Colorado Rockies to a 4-2 victory over the plummeting San Diego Padres in the opener of a three-game series on Friday.

The 29-year-old Cook (6-1) tossed seven solid innings, holding San Diego to just one run and three hits. He struck out one and walked four.

"I'm pretty confident," Cook said. "Once you get on a roll, I think your confidence tends to go up. I'm able to slow the game down now when I get into jams, and I've got total confidence in my defense."

Taylor Buchholz pitched a scoreless eighth and Brian Fuentes overcame a solo home run in the ninth to record his fourth save in six chances.

"It's been (Cook) going out and getting outs," Colorado manager Clint Hurdle said. "His rhythm has been good. He's working quick, too. His tempo is the best it's ever been. That goes back to his confidence. This string (of wins) is probably his most impressive."

Matt Holliday belted a solo shot in the eighth to extend Colorado's lead to 4-1 and send San Diego to its fifth straight defeat and 18th in its last 22 games.

San Diego starter Jake Peavy blanked Colorado over the first five frames but fell apart in the sixth after committing a throwing error and walking consecutive batters.

"I think Jake tried to make a do-or-die play," Padres manager Bud Black said of the error. "I don't think that had any correlation to the next sequence of events."

Garrett Atkins and Hawpe touched the reigning National League Cy Young Award winner with run-scoring hits to give Cook all of the support he needed.

"Peavy was pitching real good and had made a bunch of good pitches," Hawpe said. "I didn't hit the ball real hard, but I just hit it in the right spot, I guess. I was just fortunate that it got through."

Peavy (4-2) lasted six innings, allowing three runs and seven hits. He struck out six and walked two.

Brian Giles doubled in the third inning to plate Peavy and give the Padres a 1-0 lead.

San Diego wasted a promising scoring chance in the sixth, when Kevin Kouzmanoff grounded into a double play after Cook walked the first two batters of the inning. Cook then retired Jody Gerut on a comebacker to escape the jam.

"We hit a number of balls on the nose, but right at people," Black said. "We had a couple of opportunities to push a couple of runs across, but we couldn't get that hit."

Cook induced 16 groundouts against just four flyouts.