Padres RF Matt Kemp becomes first in club history to hit for cycle

San Diego Padres rightfielder Matt Kemp hit for the club’s first-ever cycle Friday night against the Colorado Rockies

San Diego Padres rightfielder Matt Kemp hit for the club’s first-ever cycle Friday night against the Colorado Rockies.

Kemp entered Friday’s game at Coors Field on a six-game hitting streak and secured the cycle with a RBI triple in the top of the ninth, building the Padres’s lead to 9–5, ultimately the game’s final score.

Kemp, now batting .262 with 13 home runs and 67 RBIs, finished the night 4-for-5 with four RBIs and two runs scored. He homered in the first inning on a two-run shot to centerfield for the Padres’s first two runs of the game, singled in the second and hit a RBI double in the seventh inning to break a 4–4 tie.

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Kemp’s triple in the ninth hit off the top of the padding of the centerfield wall and bounced back toward the infield, over the head of Rockies centerfielder Charlie Blackmon. Kemp reached third without a throw to the base.

The cycle is the Padres’s first in 7,443 games. The club had come up one hit short of the cycle 361 times and one triple short 258 times, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune’s Dennis Lin.

Kemp is in his first year with the Padres after a December trade from the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The win moved the Padres to 55–61 and dropped the Rockies to 47–67.

- Mike Fiammetta