Padres 7, Braves 2: Friedrich keeps Atlanta quiet

Christian Friedrich continued his string of mostly impressive starts tonight to lead the Padres to a 7-2 victory over the Braves. Those two runs were allowed over 6.2 innings of work on six hits and two walks. He was backed up by an offensive outburst fronted by Yangervis Solarte. He was one of four Friars with multi-hit games.

Atlanta drew first blood, with Ender Inciarte starting the game by drawing a leadoff walk. A single and a ground out sent him around the bases, but the Braves would only have the lead for a short while. In the bottom half of the first, Jon Jay led off with his 19th double of the season. He advanced on a Wil Myers ground out and scored on Matt Kemp's sacrifice fly.

The Padres broke the tie in the third inning with a two out rally. Myers and Kemp hit back to back singles, and then Solarte stepped up to the plate. After taking a sinker for a strike, he took a curveball from Williams Perez and pasted it over the right field deck.

The boys put up a couple more runs in the fifth. Myers singled again and took second on a wild pitch. Kemp stayed hot with an RBI double, at which point Perez left the game with an injury. The Braves put former Friar Casey Kelly on the mound, and he let Kemp come home.

Atlanta put a couple men on base in the seventh with a pair of singles. With two outs and runners on first and second, Andy Green pulled Friedrich for Carlos Villanueva... who promptly gave up an RBI single. It didn't matter, but the Friars got the run back in the next inning courtesy of back to back doubles from Brett Wallace and Derek Norris. Ryan Buchter mopped things up in the ninth, and that was that.

Colin Rea will try to stop the chop for a series win tomorrow night. First pitch is at 7:10 PM.