National League Roundup : Perez’s Bat Leads Reds Once Again

Tony Perez doesn’t play as much these days, but as always, he makes his swings count.

Perez hit a three-run homer--his fourth in his last four games--and drove in four runs to lead the Cincinnati Reds to a 13-11 victory over the Chicago Cubs Tuesday night at Cincinnati.

“I don’t think there’s any team in the National League that’s got a player like Tony who can come off the bench and hit a home run and drive in a lot of runs,” Cincinnati shortstop Dave Concepcion said. “I don’t see anybody in the National League playing as well as he is.”

Perez, a pinch-hitter and occasional starter, belted a three-run homer to help the Reds erase an early 6-0 deficit, then added an RBI double in a two-run seventh that wrapped up the victory in a 3-hour 17-minute slugfest. The 43-year-old Perez is 10 for his last 20 with 13 runs batted in.

Perez’s fourth homer of the season and 375th of his career gave the Reds hope in the fourth, before they again fell behind, 10-5. Perez walked in the sixth and scored the game-tying run as the Reds batted around for the second time in the game, then doubled for the 1,603rd RBI of his career to wrap it up in the seventh.

“I can’t swing the bat any better,” Perez said. “I can’t be fooled by anything. My bat is quick.”

John Franco (2-1), the fourth Red pitcher, worked the last three innings for the victory as the Cubs wasted 19 hits and leads of six and five runs.

The defeat dropped the Cubs a half-game behind the idle New York Mets in the East.

The Cubs jumped off to a 6-0 lead after three innings against Jay Tibbs, as Ron Cey hit a two-run homer, his fourth in six games. Cey later hit a two-run triple as the Cubs built a 10-5 margin.

Gary Redus’ two-run homer cut the lead to 10-7 and Cesar Cedeno’s three-run double tied the score, 10-10. Wayne Krenchicki singled home Cedeno to break the tie.

Chris Speier belted his first homer leading off the seventh to tie the game 11-11, but Perez doubled home the winning run in the bottom of the inning.

St. Louis 9, Atlanta 3--Willie McGee drove in three runs, two in a seven-run fourth inning, and Jack Clark had four hits as the Cardinals routed the Braves at Atlanta.

Bob Forsch (4-2) gave up six hits over six innings to earn the victory, with reliever Jeff Lahti going the final three innings for his third save.

Dale Murphy hit his 12th home run for the Braves and Terry Harper added a two-run shot.

Montreal 8, San Diego 5--Andre Dawson, 0 for 20 entering the game, came off the bench to drive in three runs--two on a tie-breaking, two-out double off Goose Gossage in the eighth inning--to push the Expos past the Padres at San Diego.

Dawson delivered a run-scoring pinch single in the sixth inning to put the Expos ahead, 5-4, only to have the Padres tie it on a double by Terry Kennedy and a single by Carmelo Martinez.

Steve Garvey and Kevin McReynolds each hit his seventh home run of the year for the Padres.

Pittsburgh 4, Houston 3--Junior Ortiz blooped a bases-loaded single over a drawn-in Astros’ infield in the top of the 12th inning to give the Pirates a victory at Houston.

Houston tied the score, 3-3, in the seventh on Terry Puhl’s sacrifice fly.

Pittsburgh took a 3-0 lead in the fourth on run-scoring singles by George Hendrick and Tony Pena, and Bill Almon’s sacrifice fly.

The Astros scored on an error by shortstop Almon in the fourth, and Kevin Bass singled home a run to make it 3-2 in the sixth.