NEW YORK - Vicente Padilla held the Mets hitless for six innings and Jim Thome homered as the Phillies completed a three-game sweep with a 4-1 victory Sunday.
Philadelphia, tied with Florida for the wild-card lead, finished 4-9 on a four-city road trip. The Phillies had lost six in a row coming into the series.
"After the road trip we've had, to be able to sweep three games here was really tremendous," Thome said.
Padilla allowed one run, two hits and no walks in eight innings. He struck out five, improving to 7-1 career against the New York.
"He just had such great control and kept those hitters off-balance all day," Phillies catcher Todd Pratt said.
Padilla retired 24 of 27 batters. Jose Mesa pitched the ninth for his 24th save in 27 chances.
"We ran into the trifecta in this series - they had three great pitching performances," said Mets manager Art Howe, whose team scored three runs on 11 hits in the series. "We just had trouble getting any hits."
Thome led off the second with a high drive into the left-centerfield bleachers off Jae Weong Seo for his 37th homer.
DODGERS 3, ROCKIES 0: Eric Gagne tied the major-league record with his 54th consecutive save as host Los Angeles completed a three-game sweep. Gagne gave up a hit and struck out two in the ninth, equaling the mark Tom Gordon set with Boston in 1998-99. The save was Gagne's 46th straight this season, also a major-league record.
CARDINALS 5, REDS 0: Albert Pujols homered twice and tied a career high with five RBIs, and Sterling Hitchcock threw six shutout innings for visiting St. Louis. Pujols has 37 homers this season and 108 in his career. He moved past Joe DiMaggio for third place for most homers in a player's first three seasons.
BREWERS 2, CUBS 0: Doug Davis pitched into the ninth and rightfielder Jason Conti made a sliding, game-ending catch with the bases loaded to preserve the 12th victory in 13 games for visiting Milwaukee. The Brewers won their fourth straight series - the first time they've done that since August 1996.
BRAVES 10, PIRATES 4: Andruw Jones, Vinny Castilla and Javy Lopez homered for visiting Atlanta. Shane Reynolds allowed four runs and nine hits over 71/3 innings. He has a 5.34 ERA, but the Braves have averaged 6.6 runs in his 25 starts.
PADRES 3, ASTROS 1: Jake Peavy and four relievers combined on a three-hitter as visiting San Diego dropped Houston into second place in the Central. Peavy allowed one run and one hit in six innings while striking out 10. Scott Linebrink, Mike Matthews, Jay Witasick and Rod Beck, who got his 20th save in as many chances, completed the game.
GIANTS 3, D'BACKS 1: Jason Schmidt allowed seven hits, struck out six and walked one as visiting San Francisco beat Arizona for the 12th time in 15 meetings. Benito Santiago and Edgardo Alfonzo had run-scoring doubles, and Rich Aurilia hit a sacrifice fly that opened a 3-1 lead in the Giants' two-run fifth.
