Luis Arraez, Jake Cronenworth homer as Padres power back to even series against Reds

Kevin Acee, The San Diego Union-Tribune on Jun 28, 2025

Published in Baseball

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CINCINNATI — The San Diego Padres harassed a good starting pitcher enough that he was gone after five innings.

Then they did damage against a vulnerable bullpen.

It is what they do when they are at their best, which they have not been for much of the latter half of the half-a-season that has been played.

In building a 6-4 victory over the Cincinnati Reds on Saturday, the Padres also did something even more rare for them in 2025.

They drove in all their runs with home runs.

It was their first time doing so this season in a game this season in a game in which they scored more than two runs.

The Padres came back from deficits of 3-0 and 4-1 to even the series at a game apiece on blasts to right field that were of increasing magnitude and distances — a solo homer by Luis Arraez that traveled a project 402 feet in the fifth inning, a two-run homer that Jake Cronenworth sent 403 feet in the sixth and a three-run homer Gavin Sheets launched 422 feet in the seventh.

The Padres entered the day having gotten the fewest portion of their runs via homers (28.5%) in the major leagues this season, and their 69 home runs were fewer than all but three teams.

The Padres had almost as many hits Saturday against Andrew Abbott as they had against him in his previous two starts against them, and they got rid of him two innings earlier than they had in either.

The left-hander had allowed one run on eight hits in 14 2/3 innings in those two starts, one in 2023 and one in ‘24.

Abbott, who entered Saturday’s game with a 1.79 ERA in 13 starts, left after five innings with the Reds up 3-1.

The only one of the Padres’ seven hits that cost him a run was Arraez’s homer.

Abbott stranded Sheets at second after his one-out double in the second inning. He left the bases loaded after the Padres got them that way with one out in the fourth. He also escaped without further damage in the fifth after Jackson Merrill and Fernando Tatis Jr. singled with one out.

The Reds teed off from the start on pitches Randy Vásquez left up in the zone. Arguably, he was lucky they just kept grounding singles through the infield and occasionally lining them over the infield.

Every time you looked up, there were Reds on base. Reds on the corners with fewer than two outs.

Two innings in, Vásquez had allowed seven hits, as many as he had in a game this season.

Three of those led to runs.

The Reds also answered Arraez’s homer in the bottom of the fifth with a run that was charged to Vásquez.

The Padres got to 4-3 when Jose Iglesias led off the sixth with a single and Cronenworth followed his homer 20 rows deep.

They took the lead in the seventh when Jackson Merrill led off with a double, Xander Bogaerts worked back from 0-2 to draw a one-out walk and Sheets sent a changeup at the bottom of the zone from Lyon Richardson over the wall in right-center field.

Hoeing, who replaced Vasquez with runners on second and third and one out in the fifth and yielded a sacrifice fly, worked a scoreless sixth before Adrián Morejón glided through a perfect seventh and Jason Adam a perfect eight. Closer Robert Suarez issued a one-out walk and two-out walk before earning his MLB-leading 23rd save by striking out Spencer Steer, who hit three home runs in the Reds’ 8-1 victory on Friday.

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