Ken Griffey Jr. slides safely into third as San Diego Padres third baseman Phil Nevin has the ball bounce away. (AP photo) | ZOOM |

        SAN DIEGO - For the scoreboard watchers among the Reds, there was plenty of interesting reading Friday night. The board in right field reported that all three teams ahead of the Reds in the standings had lost.

        That meant a win over the San Diego Padres would have moved the Reds to within three games of the St. Louis Cardinals in the National League Central, and within 2½ games of Los Angeles Dodgers and 1½ games of San Francisco Giants in the Wild Card race.

        The Reds couldn't pull off the win part. They fell to the Padres 4-2 before a crowd of 25,548 at Qualcomm Stadium. The Reds managed only five hits - all singles - and two unearned runs off San Diego starter Brian Lawrence (10-6) in eight innings of work.

        “He was too tough for us,“ Reds manager Bob Boone said. “We didn't do anything with him.“

        Knuckleballer Jared Fernandez (1-2) made his fifth start for the Reds, and the Padres had great success hitting his knuckler up the middle.

        The Padres scored a run in the second, third and fourth to go up 3-0.

        Fernandez was lucky to be only down three. He gave up eight hits in the first four innings after only giving up two in six innings against the New York Mets in his last outing.

        One of runs came as a result of passed ball by Kelly Stinnett. Stinnett had three passed balls on the night. That's life with the knuckler.

        “I've never had three passed balls in a game in my life,” Stinnett said.

        Fernandez ended up with another quality start: Six innings, three runs, two earned, nine hits, one walk, two strikeouts.

        “I was pleased,“ he said. “My first start on the West Coast. Those balls up the middle - a foot or two either way and they're caught.“

Padres starter Brian Lawrence went eight innings. (AP photo) | ZOOM |

        But a 3-0 deficit was rather large because the Reds were having trouble figuring out Lawrence, the 26-year-old right-hander.

        Through the first five innings, the Reds had put two runners in scoring position. After getting the runner there, the Reds were 0-for-4 with four strikeouts. Lawrence, in fact, had nine strikeouts through five innings.

        “He was good, good enough to win,“ Todd Walker said. “Anytime you give up five hits, you deserve to win. We didn't have many hard hit balls tonight.“

        But the Reds broke through for two runs in the sixth, thanks to some shoddy defense by the Padres.

        Walker started the inning with a single to right. Aaron Boone hit a ball that shortstop Deivi Cruz fielded, bobbled and threw late to first on. Adam Dunn hit into a potential double-play ball. But Dunn beat throw to first, thanks to Boone's hard slide into second.

Trevor Hoffman slammed the door, as usual. (AP photo) | ZOOM |

        Ken Griffey Jr. walked to load the bases. Austin Kearns got Walker in with a sacrifice fly to right. Russell Branyan lined a single to right to score Dunn. Branyan ended up at second and Griffey at third when Bubba Trammell bobbled the ball, then threw wildly to past third.

        Lawrence left them stranded their by striking out Barry Larkin. It was a career-high 10th strikeout for the Padres pitcher.

        Larkin left the game a half of inning later with a stiff neck.

        That was the Reds' final shot. Lawrence settled down after the sixth. He only allowed a walk the rest of the way.

        “His ball just dives,“ Stinnett said. “I was impressed with him.“

        The Padres added two runs off Scott Sullivan in the eighth to make it 5-2. Trevor Hoffman pitched a 1-2-3 ninth for his 27th save.

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