SEATTLE — The Padres played small ball, smart ball and caught the ball on Friday.
And Randy Vásquez threw the ball pretty well too.
And then, because the Padres don’t win games with drama, things got wild at the end.
After six scoreless innings from Vásquez and another from Adrian Morejón, the Mariners rallied against Jason Adam in the eighth, and manager Craig Stammen went to Mason Miller with two on and two out.
The Padres’ closer left the bases loaded in the eighth and began the bottom of the ninth by walking J.P. Crawford and surrendering a one-out single to Cole Young before ending a 2-0 victory with two strikeouts.
The Padres scored once in the fourth inning with help from a stolen base and once in the seventh inning on a pair of singles and a groundout.
In between that, they prevented two runs with a pair of superb plays in the fifth.
The Padres were not any more productive against Mariners starter Emerson Hancock than they had been when he allowed them two runs in six innings on April 15 at Petco Park.
Hancock allowed two runs in seven innings on Friday. But the Padres did hit him harder and more frequently.
They had three hits off Hancock in the second inning, which was one fewer than they had in their previous meeting.
But after loading the bases — on hard singles by Gavin Sheets and Xander Bogaerts at the start and a single by Ramón Laureano that followed Miguel Andujar’s 105 mph lineout to shortstop — Sung-Mun Song swung at the first pitch he saw and grounded into an inning-ending double play.
The Padres took a 1-0 lead two innings later when Sheets drew a nine-pitch walk with one out, stole second base with Andujar at the plate with two outs and scored on Andujar’s double.
Plays by Bogaerts and Laureano and a baserunning blunder by the Mariners kept the lead intact in the fifth. Those plays, in fact, prevented the Mariners from taking a lead.
First, Bogaerts kept a runner off the bases when he fielded a grounder by Dominic Canzone on the grass running out toward left field to his right and threw across his body on a hop to first base to get the first out of the inning.
A double by Young followed, which would have scored a run. And then Jhonny Pereda sent a sinking liner to left field that Laureano ran in and caught while sliding forward. Inexplicably, Young took off on contact and was at third base when Laureano came up with the ball. He was still at third when Laureano’s soft throw arrived at second to double him up and end the inning.
That meant their run in the seventh extended their lead.
One-out singles by Andujar and Laureano gave the Padres runners at the corners, and this time a groundout by Song got a run home.