SEATTLE (AP) — Cal Raleigh hit his major league-leading 50th homer, Jorge Polanco drove in four runs and the Seattle Mariners beat the San Diego Padres 9-6 on Monday night, Aug. 25.
J.P. Crawford had two hits and two RBIs as Seattle moved within 1 1/2 games of idle Houston for the AL West lead. Josh Naylor had two hits and scored twice.
Raleigh hit a solo shot off JP Sears in the first for his third homer in two games. The 419-foot drive to left had a 107.2 mph exit velocity.
Raleigh joined Mickey Mantle as the only switch-hitters to hit 50 homers in a season, and he became the eighth player in major league history to reach the half-century mark in August.
Fernando Tatís Jr., Gavin Sheets, Jake Cronenworth and Ramón Laureano homered for San Diego (74-58), which dropped into second in the NL West with the Dodgers’ 7-0 victory over Cincinnati. Cronenworth and Luis Arraez each had two hits.
Tatis capped the Padres’ four-run second with a two-run drive for his 18th homer. It was his first homer since July 24.
The Mariner scored five times in the fifth off David Morgan (1-2), who entered after Sears was pulled with two outs in the fourth.
Naylor drove in Julio Rodríguez with a tiebreaking single, and Polanco made it 7-4 with a two-run double. Crawford added a two-run single.
Polanco also hit a two-run drive in the second for his 20th homer.
Seattle’s Bryce Miller (3-5) permitted four runs and six hits in five innings.
Key moment
Tatis tried to make a sliding catch on Crawford’s hit in the fifth but came up empty.
Key stat
Raleigh is the second player in Mariners history to hit 50 or more homers in a single season, joining Ken Griffey Jr., who hit 56 in back-to-back seasons in 1997 and 1998.
Up next
San Diego right-hander Dylan Cease (6-11, 4.71 ERA) starts on Tuesday, and right-hander Luis Castillo (8-7, 3.57 ERA) pitches for Seattle.
