MILWAUKEE (AP) — Rowdy Tellez isn’t accustomed to waiting this long between homers.
Tellez went deep for the first time since May 22 as the Milwaukee Brewers beat the San Diego Padres 7-3 on Friday for their season high-tying sixth straight victory. Tellez’s three-run shot capped a five-run third inning.
His 406-foot drive to center off a 1-1 curve from Yu Darvish (8-10) ended a career-high string of 128 straight at bats without a homer.
“It’s just nice to do that and help the team win,” Tellez said. “It helps out personally, too.”
Brandon Woodruff (3-1) struck out 11 and allowed only one run in six innings as the NL Central-leading Brewers (71-57) moved a season-high 14 games above .500.
The Brewers also won six consecutive games from April 1-7.
“I feel like we go through this every year,” said Woodruff, who lowered his ERA to 2.65. “We go through stretches where we don’t play good. ‘Well, what’s wrong?’ Then we hit this stretch here where we’re playing good. ‘Well, dadgumit, we’re good.’ We’re just playing good baseball.”
While pitching carried Milwaukee for much of the season, the Brewers have scored at least six runs in every game of this win streak.
“A lot of people don’t think we can hit well, but we are a very timely hitting (team), kind of build on each other,” Tellez said. “We have depth in our lineup. It’s a good team. I don’t think people really understand that.”
The game was scoreless until Darvish ran into trouble in the third.
He started the inning by allowing Brice Turang’s single and hitting Tyrone Taylor with a pitch. One out later, William Contreras singled home Turang. Willy Adames continued his hot streak with a two-out RBI single before Tellez connected.
Darvish lasted just four innings and allowed six hits and five runs. He struck out three and walked one.
“Just some location stuff today,” Padres coach Bob Melvin said. “It looked like he had good stuff to start.”
Adames also singled and scored in the seventh inning. Adames has gone 12 of 26 with 10 RBIs over his last six games.
San Diego’s only runs came on homers from Manny Machado and Gary Sánchez. Machado hit a solo shot off Woodruff in the fourth inning and Sánchez had a two-run homer off Andrew Chafin in the ninth.
