Howe Says He Needs Break; Reds Don’t Get One : Hershiser Defeats Cincinnati, 8-1, Allowing Four Hits, One to Rose

On his way to a four-hit, 8-1 win over Pete Rose and the Cincinnati Reds, Orel Hershiser threatened to knock the old-timer’s teeth out. But first he asked him if he still had his own teeth.

It happened in the sixth inning of Monday’s game at Dodger Stadium, with Hershiser at bat in a bunting situation. Rose crept forward so far from first base, he could have smelled Hershiser’s breath.

Hershiser stepped back. He already had jabbered back and forth with Rose earlier in the game, after the 44-year-old man got his 4,154th career hit, which put him within 37 of Ty Cobb.

Seeing Rose tiptoe toward him, Hershiser called out: “It sure would be a shame if you got a career-ending injury and couldn’t break that record.”

“Aw, you can’t hit,” Rose called back.

“Do you wear dentures?” Hershiser suddenly asked.

“What?”

“Do you wear dentures?” Hershiser repeated.

Rose replied by giving the batter his biggest, goofiest grin, flashing all of his teeth.

“Better get a mouthpiece,” Hershiser advised, pointing his bat in Rose’s direction.

Alas, Hershiser flew to shallow center field. “Lousy infield fly. Go siddown,” Rose said as Hershiser rounded first. But since the Dodgers already were ahead, 5-1, and would get three more runs the next inning on a Greg Brock home run, it hardly mattered.

Hershiser (8-2) simply sailed along to his 11th win in his last 13 decisions over two seasons. This season alone, he has a one-hitter, two-hitter, three-hitter and now a four-hitter.

Until the eighth inning, Cincinnati’s only hit off Hershiser was the one in the fourth inning by Rose, who shanked a single to left. When the ball was returned to the mound, Hershiser tossed it into the Reds’ dugout.

That’s when the good-natured ribbing began.

“Actually, it began when we were in Cincinnati, because that’s when they started recovering the baseballs after every hit,” Hershiser said. “So, I threw this one in and called over to Pete: ‘Shoot, you get all the balls. What do I get? I’m the one who gave up the hit. At least gimme the bat or something.’ ”

“He’s my buddy,” Rose said. “I just tried to rattle him a little later on, when he was supposed to bunt. I said, ‘You can’t hit it by me.’ Just like I did to Mickey Rivers.”

To Mickey Rivers? When?

“In the (1976) World Series!” Rose said. “How soon they forget!”

A decade later, Rose is player-manager of the Reds, who had won five of their last six going into Monday’s game. The loss left them tied with the Dodgers for second place in the NL West, five games behind San Diego.

As a team, the Reds had batted .317 over those six games and had scored 34 runs. But Hershiser cooled them down on a 100-degree day. Their only run off him was unearned, coming on a bad-hop single by Eddie Milner that followed an error by Dodger third baseman Dave Anderson.

Anderson also got picked off second base, but it was hardly a bad night for him. Batting leadoff in spite of a .195 average, Anderson walked three times and showed a little power, homering to left in the second inning. “A little power is right,” said Anderson, “but hopefully it’s a sign that July is going to be a good month.”

In April, Anderson hit .163. In May, he was disabled with a disc problem. In June, he hit .216 with a homer and four RBIs. “We’ve had some problems as a team leaving runners on base, and I’ve been part of the problem,” Anderson said. “Maybe things are turning around.”

Maybe. Brock, whose batting average has been in the .210s and .220s for much of his career in the majors, hoisted it to .249 with two hits Monday. Overlooked during the recent thunderstorm of Pedro Guerrero, Brock has cracked six homers in his last 20 games. He also hit .270 during June.

Brock’s home run even came with men on base--a real rarity for the Dodgers, who have hit 46 of their 60 homers with nobody on.

Anderson’s home run redeemed him for being picked off second base in the first inning, after he and Mariano Duncan had opened the game with walks.

Cincy starter Jay Tibbs got greedy and tried to catch Duncan off first, but threw wildly, Duncan taking third. Duncan then scored on a passed ball.

When Tibbs walked Guerrero, his third walk in four batters, and went to a 2-0 count on Brock, Rose had a chat with him. Tibbs hadn’t won a game since June 2, and missed his last scheduled start with a sprained ankle.

After the discussion on the mound, Tibbs gave up singles to Brock and R.J. Reynolds, and the Dodgers had a 2-0 lead.

Anderson’s two-out homer made it 3-0, and it might have gotten worse in the fourth had Rose not made a spectacular leaping catch of a R.J. Reynolds line drive. “It wasn’t easy seeing the ball that time of day,” Rose said--the game had a 5:05 p.m. start--”but those are the ones you just gotta try to get a hand on.”

In the next inning, a spectator had exactly the same thought. He leaned across the railing in the right-field corner and touched a double by Duncan. Anderson, who was on first, would have scored easily, but was sent back to third.

After an argument by Lasorda, third-base umpire Paul Runge changed first-base umpire Bob Engel’s mind, and Anderson was sent home. Rose was not thrilled about this. “They said the guy went below the top of the fence to touch the ball,” Rose said. “I thought it bounced into the seats. If it bounces in, the man can’t score.”

As it turned out, the play didn’t mean a thing. About the only interest left in the game was whether or not Rose would get any more hits.

He got one more chance against Hershiser in the ninth inning, but it really wasn’t a chance at all. Hershiser walked him on four pitches.

Rose showed him those teeth again when he ran down the line.

Dodger Notes

Steve Howe, dropped from the roster Monday, was so depressed after giving up a home run in a recent game, he broke down crying in the manager’s office afterward. “I had a long, long talk with him and his attitude was really down,” Tom Lasorda said. “He started crying and I tried to tell him that those things happen, to forget about it, that tomorrow’s another day. You can’t let it affect you, but of course he did. He just seems to be going through a terrible time.” . . . Lasorda also said of Howe: “He’s let a lot of people down. He’s let himself down, he’s let his family down, he’s let Peter O’Malley down and he’s let his teammates down. I just hope and pray he gets himself together.”