• Preview
• Recap
• Bleachers

Baek impressive as Padres down Diamondbacks

Jul 5, 2008 - 6:23 AM PHOENIX (Ticker) -- Cha Seung Baek tossed six scoreless innings to lead the San Diego Padres to a 5-1 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday in the opener of a three-game series.

Kevin Kouzmanoff and Jody Gerut each collected two hits for the Padres, who had lost 10 of their previous 11 contests.

Chad Tracy delivered an RBI single and Dan Haren (8-5) pitched seven solid innings for the Diamondbacks, who managed just five hits en route to their 10th loss in 14 games.

"We knew what he was going to try to do to us," Arizona manager Bob Melvin said. "He throws a lot of sliders, especially in off counts. He was extending away pretty good when we were swinging and he was throwing it on the plate when we were taking. (He) just caught us in between, threw enough curveballs, fastballs in, just to keep you off, certainly not our best offensive output."

Baek (2-3), who had a no-hitter through five frames, allowed just two hits and a walk with seven strikeouts in his 94-pitch outing.

"The last couple of games I didn't throw an inside pitch," Baek said. "I threw more inside pitches today and the hitters get uncomfortable and throw outside and it worked great today. My first game against (the) D'backs in my career. They saw video and knew something, they know away, away, used inside, double up, change up and the cutter was working great today."

The South Korean righthander walked Orlando Hudson in the first inning before retiring the next 15 batters. Stephen Drew doubled with two outs in the sixth to end the no-hitter.

"That's baseball, man," Hudson said. "(Baek) mixed up all his pitches, he threw the ball very well, kept us off balance and he came out with a big victory tonight."

San Diego opened the scoring in the sixth on Brian Giles' RBI groundout. One batter later, Adrian Gonzalez delivered a sacrifice fly that extended the advantage to 2-0.

"Here again, situational hitting," San Diego manager Bud Black said. "Brian (Giles) got a run in and got him over, Adrian hit a sacrifice fly, those are the things we talk about. Those are the things we work on in spring training and we saw it come to fruition today."

After Tracy's RBI single halved the Diamondbacks' deficit, Kouzmanoff gave the Padres a 3-1 lead in the eighth with a run-scoring base hit. Edgar Gonzalez and Paul McAnulty each drove in a run for San Diego in the ninth to provide the final margin.

Haren yielded two runs and seven hits with a walk and seven strikeouts, losing for the first time since May 27.

"They didn't get a hit off me with a runner in scoring position," Haren said. "But they still got two runs, which is something different, but they did the little things tonight and we didn't do the little things, that what it pretty much came down to."