SAN DIEGO (Ticker) -- Brian Lawrence struck out eight in six innings and hit his first career home run to lead the San Diego Padres to a 6-4 victory over the Colorado Rockies.
Lawrence (2-0) allowed five hits and walked three, allowing a home run and a sacrifice fly to Todd Helton. His first career homer came off Darren Oliver in the fourth and have the Padres a 4-2 lead.
"That's a once in a lifetime deal for me," Lawrence said of the homer. "I don't know if I'll ever hit another one. It was a defensive swing with two strikes. I had fouled off a couple of curveballs. I guess adrenaline took over and I had enough to hit it out of there."
Former Colorado catcher Gary Bennett went 3-for-3 with a two-run double and drove in three runs as the Padres won for the fourth time in five home games. Bennett's wife had a baby on Thursday in Chicago.
"This will be tough to top," Bennett said. "I had quite an adrenaline rush seeing my son born. Obviously, I also played for the Rockies last year. I have a lot of friends over there. I tried not to do more than I was capable of doing."
The Rockies cut the lead to 6-4 on a two-run single by Chris Stynes off Luther Hackman in the eighth, but Brandon Villafuerte relieved and got Greg Norton to fly out to left field and struck out Ron Belliard with two runners on to end the threat.
"Our hitting with runners in scoring position was lacking," Rockies manager Clint Hurdle said. "The fact that we had runners on third base with less than two outs three times who did not score did bite us."
Colorado also threatened in the seventh, but Jesse Orosco got Helton on a pop fly to end the inning.
Helton got another chance in the ninth, coming up with Jay Payton on first base. But Villafuerte struck him out, got Larry Walker to hit into a forceout and struck out Preston Wilson to earn his second save.
"Villafuerte did a great job closing out," Padres manager Bruce Bochy said. "We got in a big jam and he bailed us out. He did his job. That was huge."
The Padres grabbed a 3-1 lead in the first inning when Oliver (1-1) issued two walks with the bases loaded and Bennett hit a sacrifice fly. Oliver allowed six runs, nine hits and four walks in 4 1/3 innings.
Mark Kotsay and Rondell White each had two hits for San Diego, and Lou Merloni added a double.
Colorado's loss was just its second in the last eight games, but the Rockies fell to 1-3 on the road.
