Dodgers Win in 12th When Cards’ Allen Loses Spit and Polish

Remarkable in their inability to score by conventional means, the Dodgers won with a spit instead of a hit Wednesday afternoon.

At least, that’s the way reliever Neil Allen of the St. Louis Cardinals tells it.

With Ken Landreaux on third and two out in the 12th, Allen, spitting before he delivered the pitch, was called for a balk by umpire John McSherry, who was working third base. McSherry sent Landreaux home with the winning run in the Dodgers’ 2-1 victory before 14,324 fans in rain-slickened Busch Stadium.

According to McSherry, Allen “got on the rubber, got himself set to pitch, started his hands up and rolled them back to where he started.

“That’s a balk, and I told Whitey (Herzog, the Cardinals’ manager) that I’m not going to make up a balk in the 12th inning.”

Allen had a different story.

“He (McSherry) told me on the field that when I spit, I took the ball out of my glove,” Allen said. “Now he has a totally different version of what happened.”

Allen, however, wasn’t really in any mood to listen to explanations. As soon as McSherry called the balk, Allen threw down the ball and his glove and charged within inches of the umpire.

“I thought he was going to bowl him over for sure,” said Dodger second baseman Mike Ramsey, once Allen’s teammate with the Cardinals.

What prompted Allen to put on the brakes?

“About 350 pounds,” Allen said, estimating McSherry’s weight.

While Cardinal third baseman Terry Pendleton restrained the enraged Allen, Herzog joined the fray, but to no avail. Herzog ended up changing pitchers, while Allen waved derisively at McSherry and continued screaming at him from the Cardinal dugout.

Finally, McSherry ejected Allen from the dugout, although the pitcher said he didn’t known that until reporters told him afterward.

“He never cursed me or nothing,” McSherry said. “I was just afraid he was going to bump me, but he never did.”

McSherry’s eyesight must be better than his hearing. “I called him everything and his mother,” said Allen, who also screamed at a TV cameraman in the Cardinal clubhouse after the game while picking up the deck chair in front of his cubicle in a threatening fashion.

Later, after he had showered, Allen was contrite, apologizing to reporters for his outburst.

“I never act like that,” he said. “I’m not a complete nut who loses control like that.

“But I’ve never had a balk called on me in seven years, or at least that I can remember.”

Herzog’s mood wasn’t much better than his pitcher’s.

“(Orel) Hershiser quick-pitches four times and there’s no call,” Herzog said. “There’s catcher’s interference and there’s no call. Our own pitcher (Danny Cox) balks in the first inning, and there’s no call.

“Then to lose a game like that? The runner wasn’t trying to deceive (Allen) and he wasn’t trying to deceive the runner. It wasn’t common sense at all.

“But they’re the four greatest umpires in the world. . . . That’s all I’m going to say, boys, before I get . . . fined.”

The whole mess could have been easily avoided, but the Dodgers kept inventing ways of getting runners to third base and leaving them there. After scoring a first-inning run for the first time since April 19, they left 10 men on in the next 10 innings.

Hershiser, whose 22-inning scoreless streak had ended in the first when Cardinal rookie Vince Coleman tripled and scored on a hit by Tommy Herr, was stranded at third in the eighth when Greg Brock grounded out.

In the ninth, the Dodgers loaded the bases with the help of two intentional walks. But pinch-hitter Al Oliver struck out against left-hander Ricky Horton after Manager Tom Lasorda had used up his best right-handed pinch-hitter, Candy Maldonado, two batters earlier in an obvious intentional-walk situation.

Then, in the 11th, the Dodgers wasted a leadoff triple by R.J. Reynolds. Reynolds, who earlier had singled twice, got no farther when Brock bounced back to the mound and Marshall hit a one-hop, double-play ball after Guerrero was walked.

But in the 12th, Landreaux, benched along with Oliver, pinch-hit for reliever Ken Howell and doubled into the right-field corner. Reynolds failed to bunt Landreaux along, striking out, but Bill Russell’s ground-out put Landreaux on third, with Brock the next hitter. Allen didn’t throw another pitch.

Mike Roarke, the Cardinal pitching coach, charged that Dodger third-base coach Joe Amalfitano called the balk first and influenced McSherry. “Joe did a good job,” Roarke said. “He’s the only one who saw it. We (the coaches) watched the replay, and we didn’t see a thing.”

Amalfitano said that he had, indeed, raised his arms and yelled for a balk. “He (Allen) is a hyper type of fellow and apt to do something not natural,” Amalfitano said. “I’ll put my hands up and holler balk, and if the guy (umpire) is watching, too, we’re in business.

“But I’m not the kind of guy who’s out there to put on a show. I’ll do that only when I see it.”

In any event, the Dodgers had their third run in 32 innings, and a split of the two-game set here.

“I wasn’t looking for a balk, but I’ll take it,” Manager Tom Lasorda said. “I’ll tell you one thing. When you look in the standings tomorrow, it’ll be in the win column.”

Dodger Notes It’s no coincidence that Terry Whitfield started in left field and R.J. Reynolds started in center Wednesday. They replaced Al Oliver and Ken Landreaux the day after two catchable flies contributed heavily to the five-run Cardinal sixth inning Tuesday night. A strong throw by Whitfield in the fourth Wednesday, which cut down Terry Pendleton trying to stretch a single into a double, probably saved a run, since the next hitter, Darrell Porter, doubled. After Porter’s hit, Dodger starter Orel Hershiser retired the next 12 batters before Lonnie Smith singled with one out in the eighth. But Smith was caught stealing by catcher Mike Scioscia on a pitchout, ending the Cardinals’ streak of consecutive steals at 27. . . . Hershiser, who gave up six hits in the first four innings, said that a 36-minute rain delay at the start of the game caused his back to stiffen in the first three innings, but that he was OK thereafter. . . . Ken Howell worked three hitless innings, striking out three, for his first win, and Tom Niedenfuer worked a 1-2-3 12th for his first save.

The Cardinals argued in the 11th that Scioscia interfered with Tommy Herr, who said he struck Scioscia’s mitt with his bat while fouling off a pitch. Scioscia, spotting Lonnie Smith breaking for second, jumped out of his crouch before the ball arrived. “I don’t know what I hit first, the ball or the glove, but I know I definitely hit his glove,” Herr said. Scioscia said he didn’t recall Herr’s bat hitting his mitt. “If they had called interference, I would have argued like hell,” Scioscia said. . . . Hershiser pitched Wednesday because Manager Tom Lasorda, who originally scheduled Rick Honeycutt, wanted to keep Hershiser on his schedule of four days’ rest. Honeycutt will open in Pittsburgh Friday. . . . The only two Dodgers to get three hits in a game before Reynolds were Pedro Guerrero and Mariano Duncan. . . . Greg Brock, out since last Friday with sprained elbows, started and had a walk and single in six appearances at the plate. . . . Before Howell struck him out in the 11th on a 3-and-2 slider, Jack Clark hit two shots that went just foul down the third-base line or otherwise could have been game-winning hits. “I knew if I hung one pitch, I was going to get beat,” Howell said.

The Dodgers scored in the first inning of only 36 games last season, lowest total in the league. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, teams that scored in the first inning won 65% of their games. . . . Jay Johnstone on Hershiser: “He’s our pirates’ treasure--the only guy who goes to the mound with a sunken chest.”