Padres complete sweep of Pirates

July 26, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

Associated Press

PITTSBURGH

Two years after the Pirates won 67 games and the Padres won only 63, the opposite-coast franchises possess the National League’s two lowest payrolls. On the field, they don’t begin to resemble each other.

Adrian Gonzalez and Chris Denorfia homered, Wade LeBlanc won for the first time in six weeks and first-place San Diego finished off its only series sweep in Pittsburgh since 1998, beating the last-place Pirates 6-3 on Sunday.

The Padres have won all 10 series in Pittsburgh since PNC Park opened in 2001, but hadn’t swept one there before outscoring the Pirates 20-8 in the three weekend games.

San Diego swept a two-game series in now-demolished Three Rivers Stadium 12 years ago but hadn’t swept a series of at least three games since winning four in a row Aug. 8-11, 1996.

An infrequent big inning by a team that relies mostly on situational hitting, a strong starting staff and an even better bullpen decided this one as the Padres (58-39) won their eighth in 10 games to improve to 19 games over .500 for the first time since — yes, 1998.

“You can look at 19 games over .500 all you want, but if you don’t finish on top of the division it doesn’t really matter,” Gonzalez said.

The Pirates, by contrast, are 30 games below .500 at 34-64 during what is fast becoming their worst season since they lost 104 games in 1985.

Gonzalez’s two-run homer, his 21st, highlighted a five-run third inning against Pirates rookie Brad Lincoln (1-4), who has a 9.61 ERA this month and was optioned back to Triple-A Indianapolis following his fourth successive flawed start.

Denorfia, who drove in three runs, chased Lincoln with a solo homer in the seventh, the Padres’ second homer in four innings after they won 5-3 on Friday and 9-2 on Saturday without homering.