Manny Machado of the San Diego Padres had been off to a bit of a slow start to the 2022 Major League Baseball regular season. In his first seven games, he only batted .231 with zero home runs and two runs batted in. It is interestingly in baseball how one game can turn things around.
On Thursday, Machado, a native of Hialeah, Florida, was simply sensational. He became only the third Padres player in franchise history to have five hits and two stolen bases in the same game as San Diego clobbered the Atlanta Braves 12-1. Of Machado’s five hits, four were singles, and the other was a home run. Machado’s home run was a seventh inning blast off of Braves reliever Will Smith, which scored Austin Nola. At the time, it put the Padres up 9-0.
The first Padres player to record five hits and two stolen bases in a game was Gene Richards on July 26, 1977. The rookie centerfielder from Monticello, South Carolina was batting leadoff for San Diego in a 5-2 Padres extra inning loss to the Montreal Expos in a game that went 15 innings. Richards actually had six hits and two stolen bases in the contest. Of Richards’s six hits, five were singles and one was a double. He had seven at bats overall.
The second Padres player to record five hits and two stolen bases in a game was the late Tony Gwynn of Los Angeles, California. Interestingly, Gwynn also recorded his monster game against the Braves in a 7-6 San Diego win on August 11, 1987. Like Machado, Gwynn had four singles and one home run.
After the five hits, Machado is now batting .344 with one home run and five runs batted in, with 11 hits, and three stolen bases. San Diego has improved to a record of five wins and three losses, and are in first place in the National League West. The odds of the Padres winning the World Series is +1800 according to betonline.ag.
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