Gonzalez's slam off Valdes in 11th gives Padres win over Mets

SAN DIEGO - The Mets have not won consecutive games on the road in 11 months, and for Johan Santana, the wait for a run probably felt just as long as he plowed through last night's game against the Padres at PETCO Park.

Santana finally got that elusive run after the Mets had failed to score in 11 innings for him, dating to Friday's start in Milwaukee. But that was of little consolation after Francisco Rodriguez, who was one strike away from a four-out save, torched Santana's effort by allowing David Eckstein's tying RBI single up the middle in the ninth inning.

Once Raul Valdes entered for the 11th inning, everyone inside PETCO Park knew where this game was headed. Valdes didn't retire a batter in his last appearance Monday night, and twice walked in a run with the bases loaded.

This time, Valdes loaded the bases again by hitting Eckstein in the knee with one out, and Adrian Gonzalez blasted a grand slam into the leftfield seats to send the Mets back to New York a 5-1 loser to the Padres.

It was the second time on this trip that the Mets lost on a walkoff homer. The other? Santana's start last Friday, when he pitched eight scoreless innings before the Brewers' Corey Hart hit a two-run homer off Ryota Igarashi in the ninth.

"It's been crazy," Santana said. "But there's not much I can do. K-Rod's been doing this for a long time and I trust him. It's just one of those days where things didn't work out. We'll go back home and start winning games again."

That's the only place these Mets, who dropped back to 27-27, can win, apparently. They slipped to 2-4 on the trip and have not won a road series in nine tries. The Mets also have failed to win back-to-back games on the road since July 25-26 of last season in Houston. The 55-game drought is the Mets' longest since a 64-game stretch during the 1963-64 seasons.

"The thing that's more frustrating than anything is that we need to win when Johan starts," said Jeff Francoeur, who disgustedly brought up that the Mets are just 6-6 in Santana's games. "That's unacceptable. When he starts, we've got to win 75 percent of the time."

Santana pitched seven scoreless innings in stretching his personal streak to 15. But he still got stuck with his fifth no-decision, to go with one win, despite a 1.42 ERA in his last six starts. It was Santana's 11th start for the Mets in which he went at least seven innings and gave up two or fewer runs and wound up with a no-decision.

"Hopefully, these things will turn around,'' manager Jerry Manuel said.Santana struggled early, throwing 60 pitches in three innings, but seemed to have a better feel for his changeup after Francoeur's RBI single in the fourth gave him a 1-0 lead. Manuel stuck with Santana for 123 pitches - he pulled him after 105 last Friday in a scoreless game - and by then he felt his leaky bullpen could hold on.

But K-Rod, after striking out Will Venable to end the eighth, immediately ran into trouble in the ninth when Tony Gwynn led off with a single to rightfield. Gwynn stole second, but K-Rod followed by striking out Matt Stairs and Jerry Hairston Jr.

K-Rod got ahead 0-and-2 to Eckstein before he slapped a grounder back over the mound and into centerfield past the diving Jose Reyes. Gwynn scored the tying run easily to hand K-Rod his third blown save in 13 chances this season. The Mets cut down the go-ahead run at the plate on Gonzalez's double that inning, and K-Rod came back out for a scoreless 10th.

"If I make the mess," Rodriguez said. "I'd like to clean it up."

With few reliable options, Manuel went with Valdes for the 11th, and Gonzalez delivered the Padres' first walkoff grand slam since Everth Cabrera's shot off K-Rod last August.