Nick Pivetta plays stopper as Padres top Giants, snap four-game skid

Nick Pivetta survived another Giants ambush.

Then he got back to doing what he does best: playing stopper.

The fiery right-hander tied a season high with 10 strikeouts over six strong innings after giving up a leadoff homer, Manny Machado ended a 14-game RBI drought and the Padres beat the Giants 5-1 in front of a sellout crowd of 40,624 to snap a four-game skid.

“It takes a team effort,” Pivetta said. “Getting (bombed) in the first, and guys bounced back really early … made a lot of really good plays behind me, good ABs all throughout the game, and (that) gave me some freedom.”

The Padres hadn’t won since Pivetta last climbed a mound on Wednesday in San Francisco, a blowout that catapulted the team into first place in the NL West this deep into a season for the first time since 2010.

They didn’t get all that comfortable with the view from the top, losing all three games in Los Angeles and a fourth straight game on Monday to start the homestand.

The Padres, however, improved to 10-3 in games started by Pivetta after a loss.

It was also the second time this year that a Pivetta start halted a four-game skid, as he did the same in late April, also with the Giants in town.

This time, Pivetta served up a leadoff homer to Jung Hoo Lee in the first inning and then circled the wagons to get through six innings of one-run ball. He scattered three hits, two walks and a hit batter while throwing a season-high 109 pitches (71 strikes).

Pivetta struck out three batters in both the third and fourth innings and stranded Lee’s one-out double in the fifth with left-hander Adrián Morejón warming in the bullpen.

After the Padres added a fourth run on an RBI single from Ryan O’Hearn in the bottom of the inning, Pivetta came back out for the sixth and struck out two more batters, the last a called strike three on Christian Koss that sent the Padres’ right-hander yelling and flexing as he stomped off the mound.

“I really wanted that 10th punchy really bad, so I was pretty happy with that,” Pivetta said. “But I think it’s just overall, just the way I pitch. I’m an emotional person, but I care a lot about my teammates. Care a lot about this organization, and I want to win, so I’m gonna let emotion out.”

It’s a scene that O’Hearn saw plenty when his Orioles faced Pivetta’s Red Sox.

Needless to say, it hits a bit different now, especially when Pivetta is leading the charge to stop a skid.

“Playing against Nick for years when he was in Boston, I was like, ‘Man, this guy’s — I don’t know about this guy.’ But playing with him, I love him,” O’Hearn said. “He’s awesome. And just what a competitor he is when he takes the ball, you feel good about having a guy like that on your team.”

Tuesday’s ambush wasn’t nearly as destructive as Monday’s, when Heliot Ramos and Rafael Devers hit back-to-back homers before a third blast from Wilmer Flores dug the Padres into a 4-0 hole in the first inning.

A day later, Lee hit the second pitch of the game over the wall in right-center for a 1-0 lead.

Pivetta walked two batters in the first inning as well but escaped further damage.

The Padres, sans Jackson Merrill (ankle) and Jake Cronenworth (elbow), wasted little time getting that run back.

Fernando Tatis Jr. reached on a throwing error, moved to third on Luis Arraez’s ensuing double to right and scored when Machado tapped a ball gently up the third base line.

It was still significant.

Machado hadn’t driven in a run since Aug. 2, tied for the longest RBI drought of his career, and entered the game with a .210/.290/.258 batting line this month.

Perhaps that broke a seal of sorts.

Machado doubled in the fifth inning to set up O’Hearn’s run-scoring single and singled in the sixth inning for his first multi-hit game since Aug. 5.

The Padres knocked right-hander Kai-Wei Teng around for seven runs — six earned — in 1⅔ innings in last week’s start in San Francisco.

On Tuesday, Teng pitched into the fourth inning before the Padres’ breakthrough.

O’Hearn singled to start the inning, Xander Bogaerts was hit by a pitch and after a walk to Gavin Sheets loaded the bases with one out, Jose Iglesias punched a single to left for a 2-1 lead.

That ended the night for Teng, but his line wasn’t final until after reliever Spencer Bivens walked Tatis to give the Padres a two-run cushion.

After O’Hearn’s run-scoring single in the fifth, Arraez added a run-scoring fielder’s choice in the sixth for a 5-1 lead for a Padres bullpen that turned to Morejón in the seventh inning.

Jason Adam pitched a scoreless eighth and Robert Suarez did the same in the ninth.

“This is the blueprint for how it works,” Padres manager Mike Shildt said. “I mean, it’s how we play. I mean, got to score at least four runs. Bullpen was fantastic. Starter got into the sixth, played clean, defensively, tough at-bats, worked our walks, better as the game went.

“It was absolutely how we win a lot of games.”