Padres clinch NL's top wild-card spot, will host playoff series after beating Diamondbacks

PHOENIX — The San Diego Padres are coming home.

They scored enough early in Friday’s game and have won enough throughout the season to have earned the right to host a playoff series.

It was a 5-3 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks at Chase Field coupled with the New York Mets’ 8-4 loss in Milwaukee that clinched the top-wild card spot for the Padres.

Yu Darvish was charged with three runs in 5 1/3 innings and got the win, his 203rd between Japan (93) and MLB (110). That tied him with Hiroki Kuroda for most ever by a Japanese-born player.

The win for the Padres was their 92nd of the season, tied with the 1984 team for second most ever and trailing only the 1998 team’s 98 victories. Those other two teams went to the World Series.

For that, they will be home for the entirety of a best-of-three wild-card series beginning Tuesday.

Season-ticket holders and those on the waiting list have snatched up most of the tickets for the series.

The less than 1,000 tickets that remain will go on sale Saturday morning.

Game times have not been set and will not until an opponent is known.

And there is no telling who will be coming to San Diego, as an exciting few days lie ahead for the three teams vying for the other two wild-card spots.

The Atlanta Braves were the only one of the three to win Friday, so they moved into a virtual tie with the Diamondbacks and Mets.

Those results made it more likely the Mets and Braves will play at least one game of their scheduled doubleheader on Monday, a circumstance necessitated when the final two games in their series this week were postponed by rain.

For the Padres, Friday was basically eight innings of survival after they opened with a four-run top of the first.

Two pitches into the game, Luis Arraez sent a fly ball to the vast area in right-center field that landed on the warning track as he ran to second base.

Arraez moved to third on Fernando Tatis Jr.’s groundout to second base, and then things got a little ugly for second baseman Ketel Marte and Diamondbacks starting pitcher Merrill Kelly.

A not-all-that-hard grounder by Manny Machado skipped off Marte’s glove and into right field for a single that scored Arraez and sent Profar to third. Jackson Merrill followed with a single that scored Profar. Next up, Xander Bogaerts sent a grounder to shortstop Geraldo Perdomo, who threw to Marte at second base to force out Merrill before Marte sailed his throw to first, allowing Machado to score.

And after a walk by Jake Cronenworth, David Peralta’s single through the right side scored Boagerts.

The Diamondbacks, who have for the most past two months been almost as resilient as the Padres, struck back halfway in the first.

Corbin Carroll hit Darvish’ third pitch 412 feet and into the seats beyond right field, and Darvish went on to walk the next better and hit the next before a fielder’s choice grounder moved both runners over and Lourdes Gurriel Jr. made it 4-2 with a sacrifice fly.

The Padres added a run in the fourth inning on a single by Kyle Higashioka and triple by Arraez.

Darvish went on after the first inning to retire 10 of the next 12 batters to get two outs into the fifth inning with no one one before he walked Carroll and Marte. He got the final out of the fifth and first out in the sixth before hitting Gurriel.

Jeremiah Estrada replaced Darvish, but Gurriel went to second during Pavin Smith’s strikeout and scored on a single by Eugenio Suarez.

Adrián Morejón got the first two outs in the seventh before a pinch-hit double by Randall Grichuk prompted Mike Shildt to go to Jason Adam, who struck out cleanup hitter Christian Walker and then worked a scoreless eighth inning.

Robert Suarez worked around a one-out walk to get his 36th save of the season and his fifth in his past eight opportunities.