Scott McGough Gives Two Homers in 9th in 5-4 Loss to Padres

In an ending that is all too familiar to the Diamondbacks, and their fans, they suffered a blown save in the ninth inning when Scott McGough gave up back-to-back homers in a 5-4 loss. 

The D-backs had taken a 4-3 lead in the top of the ninth when Evan Longoria barreled up a slider and drove it into the upper deck in left. But McGough failed to record an out in the bottom half of the inning. He had just picked up his first major league save a day earlier in Los Angeles.  But on this night he left a splitter up and out over the plate for pinch hitter David Dahl who drove it just over the wall in left center to tie the game at 4-4.  Then after falling behind 3-1 to Ha-Seong Kim, he hung a slider over the middle of the plate and Kim drove it to deep left for the game winning walk off homer. 

The game started off rough for the D-backs when starter Ryne Nelson was charged with a pitch time violation on the second pitch of the game. He seemed to be struggling with the pitch come, but failed to alert the umpire and was charged a ball. Trent Grisham singled and then Nelson put a 94 MPH fastball middle middle over the plate to Juan Soto who drilled it to center field for a homer and a 2-0 San Diego lead. Nelson walked two more batters in the inning but battled through to get out of it with no further damage, despite needing 32 pitches to get through it.   

Singles by Longoria, Corbin Carroll and and Nick Ahmed, led to a run in the top of the second. One more came home on a ground ball double play and the D-backs had tied it up 2-2.

A double and a walk in the bottom of the 2nd put Nelson right back in trouble however. He almost got of that jam too, but a fluke squib ground ball by Manny Machado hit off the first base bag, resulting in an RBI infield single and a 3-2 Padres lead.

To that point Nelson had thrown 58 pitches and it looked like another short outing for a D-backs starter. But Nelson managed to battle through the next three innings, putting up zeroes while giving up just two more hits. 

That effort by Nelson and three  combined scoreless innings by Cole Sulser, Miguel Castro and Andrew Chafin gave the D-backs a chance to get back in the game. That happened when Corbin Carroll hit his first homer of the year in the 7th to tie it up at 3-3. Carroll also had a single in the 9th for the first three hit game of his career.