Arizona Diamondbacks offense fizzles in loss to Padres

PHOENIX — In their last two games, both wins, the Arizona Diamondbacks produced a total of 18 runs off 21 hits and 13 walks.

For Wednesday’s matchup against the San Diego Padres, however, they didn’t have much left over to use. Arizona lost 4-0 and had three hits with two walks.

“They made pitches and we didn’t get the results,” D-backs manager Torey Lovullo said, noting how he’s been asked a lot this season about Arizona’s inconsistent offense. “You can look at it a couple of ways. I’ve been saying all along I think this team is a very good offensive team. I think we need to be stubborn to our approach. Hitting is hard. I want to acknowledge that. But we have to be stubborn to our approach and have smarter at-bats.”

D-backs starter Madison Bumgarner had one of his better outings in the last two months when it comes to the amount of damage off him.

Unfortunately for Arizona, though, Bumgarner wasn’t able to pitch deep into the game.

Bumgarner only threw 40 pitches in the first three innings and then retired the first two Padres batters in the fourth before a six-pitch single and nine-pitch walk extended the inning. With his first two outs each taking six pitches on strikeouts, plus another for the third and final out, Bumgarner’s pitch count quickly expanded to 73.

No runs had crossed the board yet but that did not last for all of Bumgarner’s stay.

Once again, he recorded two outs to open the fifth inning. San Diego then had a walk and single put second baseman Jake Cronenworth in a position to bring home the game’s first run and he did so with an RBI single. Bumgarner got the next Padre out to wind up at 105 pitches and end his night at 5.0 innings with one earned run off four hits and three walks.

“I thought he had real good life and finish to all of his pitches early on,” Lovullo said of Bumgarner. “Just those two innings of full pitch counts ran his pitch count up over 100 pitches but he did enough to help us stay in the ballgame.”

San Diego scored a run off Kyle Nelson (unearned) in the sixth, another off Noe Ramirez (earned) in the seventh and a fourth insurance run off Ian Kennedy (earned) in the ninth.

The D-backs went 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position. In the third inning with one out, Josh Rojas grounded out to move Geraldo Perdomo to third base before Alek Thomas struck out. Five innings later, Rojas did the same thing with runners on first and second. Then Thomas came up short again, this time with a groundout.

A David Peralta double in the ninth with two outs was followed by a Daulton Varsho flyout to end the game.

Mike Clevinger tossed the first six scoreless innings for the Padres and then reliever Nick Martinez, who has 10 starts this season, covered the last three.

Follow @KellanOlson