NL East Wrap: Braves complete sweep of Marlins

Braves 6, Marlins 2

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MIAMI -- At this rate, Atlanta manager Fredi Gonzalez wouldn't mind sending Dan Uggla down to the minors for a day.

Only because Uggla is hitting so well, Gonzalez wants to keep the Braves second baseman in a groove.

Uggla extended his hitting streak to 31 games, the longest in the majors this season, with a two-run single in the first inning that sent the Braves past the Florida Marlins 6-2 Wednesday night for a three-game sweep.

The Braves, who sent Florida to its seventh straight loss, are off Thursday.

"Let's find a game for him to play tomorrow so he can stay hot," Gonzalez said. "We're going to send him to Gwinnett or Mobile or one of those places so he can keep swinging it."

Uggla tied Rico Carty for the second-longest hitting streak in franchise history. Tommy Holmes hit in 37 straight for the Boston Braves in 1945.

"It's crazy," Uggla said. "Was that one of the things I thought about when I got over here? No, obviously not, but it's a cool thing. This is an awesome organization and to have some kind of record with this organization is really special."

Uggla went 3 for 5. It was his ninth multihit game during the longest hitting streak in the majors this season. He is batting .224 overall this year.

"It's great, I love him," Braves pitcher Tim Hudson said. "He's been an unbelievable teammate all year. He plays hard every single day. When he had his struggles early on, he never made excuses, he played hard. When fans were booing him, he never let his head drop and he's prevailing now."

Hudson (12-7) allowed two runs in 7 1-3 innings and struck out seven. The Marlins scored twice off him in the eighth.

"He was dominant," Gonzalez said.

Logan Morrison hit his 17th home run for the Marlins.

"We have to find a way to get the job done against those better teams," Morrison said.
Padres 9, Mets 5

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NEW YORK -- After squandering late leads in each of the previous two games, the San Diego Padres were determined not to let it happen again.

Will Venable sparked San Diego's surging offense with four hits from the leadoff spot and the Padres' proud bullpen rebounded from consecutive flops, finally holding off the New York Mets in a 9-5 victory Wednesday night.

"It was a shocker and we were just like, there's no way how it's going to happen three nights in a row," All-Star closer Heath Bell said. "We kind of figure we have to be really good. We've got to be on our A game or we're not going to win."

This one didn't come easy, though.

An error by second baseman Logan Forsythe allowed the Mets to cut the deficit to four in the ninth inning. With the bases loaded, Forsythe then made a leaping grab of Willie Harris' line drive for the final out.

"It's nice to get another shot at it, especially to help Heath out," Forsythe said. "I wanted the ball again because I wanted to redeem myself. Because I'd be a lot more frustrated right now if that would have hurt us."

Aaron Harang (11-3) won his second straight start despite giving up at least 10 hits in each outing. Cameron Maybin had two RBIs and the Padres built a cushion with a three-run ninth.

Venable scored three times. He tripled, singled and doubled twice for the Padres, who rank at or near the bottom of the National League in nearly every major offensive category. But they have 56 runs in their last six games, going 4-2 during that stretch.

"It's been great. I mean, I think it's something that slowly started a while ago," Venable said. "It's disappointing sometimes as an offensive player not to give the pitchers the support that they deserve offensively, and to be able to get that started a little bit is nice and hopefully we can all just keep rolling."

Cubs 4, Nationals 2

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CHICAGO -- Reed Johnson, Alfonso Soriano and Geovany Soto each homered Wednesday night and the Chicago Cubs kept up their power surge in a 4-2 win over the Washington Nationals.

The Cubs have connected in eight straight games and have hit 19 home runs over that stretch.

Johnson added three singles in his seventh career four-hit game. Soriano also doubled and drove in two runs and Soto scored twice.

Rodrigo Lopez (3-3) allowed one earned run and five hits in 5 2-3 innings. He gave up 12 earned runs over 8 1-3 innings in his previous two starts.

Carlos Marmol struck out three in a scoreless ninth for his 25th save in 32 chances.

Ross Detwiler (1-2) gave up three runs and seven hits over five innings. He fell to 0-8 in 16 career road appearances, including 10 starts.

Jayson Werth hit a solo home run and singled for Washington.

The Nationals scored first, getting an unearned run in the opening inning on a throwing error by shortstop Starlin Castro that let Ryan Zimmerman to score all the way from first. The Cubs have surrendered 90 first-inning runs this season, the most in the big leagues.

Castro's miscue was the Cubs' 95th error on the season, most in the National League. Lopez recovered to retire the next nine batters and hold the Nationals scoreless until Werth's homer in the sixth.

Zimmerman extended his hitting streak to 18 games. That's the second longest for the Nationals in the seven seasons since they moved to Washington from Montreal. Zimmerman had a 30-game hitting streak in 2009.

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