Padres outslug Rockies 10-8 in high-scoring road win

The Padres left Coors Field with a win that said as much about resilience as it did about the thin air. San Diego erased an 8-5 deficit in the ninth inning, scored five times, and beat the Rockies 10-8 on Thursday in Denver, a game that featured 27 combined hits, two Colorado errors, and plenty of late stress for both clubs.

Gavin Sheets delivered the swing that changed everything, launching a three-run homer on his 30th birthday to put San Diego ahead after the Padres opened the ninth trailing by three. The rally started with a leadoff walk and kept rolling with four straight hits, a sequence that turned a rough night into another series win over Colorado. The Padres salvaged their sixth straight series victory against the Rockies, a stretch that again showed San Diego has handled this matchup better than Colorado has.

For the Padres, the comeback offered a useful test of depth. San Diego finished with 13 hits and still had to survive a final inning in which Colorado had already forced the game into a slugfest. Fernando Tatis Jr. and the top of the lineup helped keep pressure on the Rockies, but the difference came when the Padres kept answering late and then asked their bullpen to finish a game that was still very much in doubt.

That ending belonged to Mason Miller, who earned his ninth save in nine chances and extended a scoreless streak to 33 2/3 innings over 31 regular-season games. He worked around a final push from Colorado by inducing a grounder from Tyler Freeman, allowing a single to Troy Johnston, and then closing the door with a 5-4-3 double play on Ezequiel Tovar. Ron Marinaccio got the win to move to 1-0, while Victor Vodnik took the loss after allowing five runs without recording an out in the ninth.

The box score leaves both clubs with questions. Colorado’s 14 hits and Mickey Moniak’s two home runs, including one in the first inning and another in the sixth, were enough to keep the Rockies in front deep into the game, but eight runs at home still were not enough to protect a lead. San Diego, meanwhile, showed it can score in bunches and survive chaos, but it also needed a late miracle to overcome a night when neither pitching staff controlled the park. At Coors Field, that can happen. It can also reveal which team is built to win when the game stops being tidy.