Dodgers walk off with win

Published 9:00 pm Saturday, July 7, 2001

By Larry LaRue

The News Tribune

LOS ANGELES – By the sixth inning, it felt like the kind of game that one swing would decide – and the Seattle Mariners couldn’t find that swing.

In the bottom of the ninth inning, the Dodgers did, and Adrian Beltre’s solo home run broke a tie and gave Los Angeles a 2-1 victory over Seattle.

“We had a few chances, we had the bases loaded in the ninth inning and Mike Cameron at the plate,” manager Lou Piniella said. “Mike’s done the job all season, but today they pitched just a bit better than we did. It happens.

“You give up two runs in two games, that’s pretty good pitching. Today, they were just a little better.”

Coming off the Freddy Garcia shutout on Friday, starter Paul Abbott gave up one run in 5 2/3innings Saturday. Newly-selected All-Star Jeff Nelson worked a scoreless 1 1/3 innings. Arthur Rhodes retired the only man he faced.

But no bullpen can stay perfect indefinitely, and in the ninth inning, Jose Paniagua made a mistake. After striking out Marquis Grissom, he jumped ahead of Beltre in the count, 0-1.

Paniagua’s last pitch was a fastball, not quite as far in as he wanted. Beltre hit it out to left-center field and the Dodgers had won a pitching duel.

“We’ve been in that situation a lot this year, where we needed a big hit and got one,” said John Olerud, whose solo home run was Seattle’s only run. “Today, we just didn’t get that one big hit. Neither did they, until the very end.”

Against Abbott, the Dodgers managed a run on Gary Sheffield’s 18th home run.

Against Terry Adams, the Mariners managed a run on Olerud’s 11th.

Until the ninth inning, that was the scoring for both teams – although each came close before Beltre’s game-ender.

For the Mariners, every opportunity ended in frustration.

After Mark McLemore had singled to open the fourth inning, Piniella flashed a one-out hit-and-run sign with Olerud at the plate. McLemore took off for second, Olerud took the pitch- a missed sign – and McLemore was caught in a run down and tagged out.

On the next pitch, Olerud homered.

Until the ninth inning, that had been Seattle’s best shot. Then Dodgers reliever Matt Herges created a rally on his own. He walked Ichiro Suzuki with one out, hit Bret Boone and then walked Olerud with two outs to load the bases.

Cameron fell behind in the count, then popped out – and afterward was angry about the calls of plate umpire Chuck Meriwether.

“The guy before me walks on four pitches, the pitcher has walked two guys and hit another and against me he gets the corners called?” Cameron said. “The first pitch was down and in, but I’m down 0-1. All of a sudden, the strike zone was wide open.

“The last pitch was a fastball up but what, I’m going to take a pitch and get rung up? Nobody’s going to care if it’s out of the zone – so I took my best shot at it.”

A game dominated by pitching also featured a scare for both teams.

Nelson, picked by Yankees manager Joe Torre to replace the ailing Mariano Rivera in Tuesday’s All-Star game, came into the game more nervous than usual.

“I didn’t want to mess up as an All-Star,” he said, shrugging.

What Nelson did was strike out the first four Dodgers he faced, though he admitted his pitches were moving more than he expected.

“I struck out (Jeff) Reboulet on an inside pitch that was supposed to be outside,” Nelson said. “My ball was really running.”

And opening the eighth inning, Nelson threw a 94 mph pitch that ran up and in – and hit Dodger catcher Paul Lo Duca in the helmet.

“That’s the last thing I want to do in a tie game, put a man aboard, and the last place I’d throw at somebody if I were trying to hit them,” Nelson said.

Lo Duca stayed in the game until the Dodgers pulled him for a pinch-runner when he reached second base, but after the game he insisted he was fine.

The Seattle offense for a day was not – three hits, total.

“You’re not going to be many teams with one run and three hits,” Olerud said.

“We didn’t hit a lick and we got beat,” said Boone, who was hit on the thigh by a ninth-inning Herges fastball. “We pitched well enough to win. We didn’t hit well enough.”

Abbott was disappointed at being pulled in the sixth inning, but understood the move.

“From a pride standpoint, I want to go at least seven innings every time, but this was a National League game, and they’re played a little different,” Abbott said. “For one thing, teams don’t score as much, so managers work it differently than in our league.”

Piniella was asked if he would say anything to his team before the game today, and he thought a moment.

“I’ll say ‘Play hard and take three days off,’” he said. “That’s it.”