Giants Beat Padres and Lead the West

Felipe Alou had just finished telling the story of his new five-liter bottle of red wine, a congratulatory gift from his employers for his 1,000th managerial victory, when someone reminded him that the Giants now lead the National League West.

“Oh man,” the San Francisco manager said with a smile. “Oh, yeah, it means something. Just a week ago, seven days ago, we were supposed to be that bad.

“I don’t really worry about it. I left all my worries behind me now.”

Jason Schmidt won for the first time in more than six weeks, and the Giants took over first place in the division with a 4-3 victory over the San Diego Padres on Saturday night.

Eliezer Alfonzo hit a two-run single, doubled and scored twice, and Randy Winn had a sacrifice fly as San Francisco moved half a game ahead of the Padres and into the division lead for the first time since April 26 with their season-best fifth consecutive victory.

The Giants’ winning streak is their longest since also winning five in a row from Sept. 16-21.

Schmidt (7-6) pitched six solid innings to end a seven-start winless stretch and a three-game losing streak.

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ROUNDUP

at Arizona 4, Colorado 3: Luis Gonzalez hit a 1-1 pitch from Colorado reliever Jose Mesa 416 feet into the right-field seats for a game-winning home run in the eighth. Arizona rookie Carlos Quentin homered for the second time in two major league games. He also doubled and drove in two runs.

at Florida 5, Pittsburgh 0: Rookie Ricky Nolasco (8-6) gave up four hits in 7 1/3 innings and struck out seven. Nolasco joins fellow rookies Josh Johnson (8-5) and Scott Olsen (8-4) with eight wins. The last team to have three rookies record eight-plus wins was the 2003 Diamondbacks: Oscar Villareal (10-7), Brandon Webb (10-9) and Stephen Randolph (8-1).

at Cincinnati 8, Milwaukee 7: Ryal Freel hit two solo home runs, including a tiebreaking shot in the eighth inning. The Reds are 7-2 since the All-Star break. The Brewers have lost nine of their last 11.

at New York 4, Houston 3: Orlando Hernandez (6-8) overcame a shaky start and Xavier Nady hit a three-run homer to lead the Mets. The Astros dropped their third in a row and ninth in 12 games to fall a season-worst six games below .500.

at Washington 7, Chicago 3: Alfonso Soriano had four extra-base hits to raise his average to .467 since the All-Star break.

Atlanta at Philadelphia, postponed: Rain forced the postponement of the Phillies-Braves game. It has been rescheduled as part of a day-night doubleheader on Sept. 2.