Dodgers Can’t Be Choosers, Win Again

There hasn’t been this much giddiness in the Dodger clubhouse since the days before the clowning Jay Johnstone left to sell auto parts on a full-time basis.

Three-game winning streaks can do that for a team that hadn’t won a third game in a row since June 11.

“We’re hot,” Enos Cabell said in the festive atmosphere that accompanied the Dodgers’ 6-5 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates Wednesday night before a crowd of 21,756 in Three Rivers Stadium.

“We’re hot,” Cabell repeated. “We’ve won four games on this trip.”

The Dodgers are now alone in fifth place, a game ahead of Atlanta and just half a game behind Cincinnati. Cabell even had an answer for the spoilsport who mentioned that the teams the Dodgers have beaten on this tour--the St. Louis Cardinals and Pirates--could qualify for disaster relief in some states.

“We couldn’t beat ‘em the last time we were here,” Cabell said.

“We’ve just got to keep going. Win tomorrow with Fernando, then win two out of three in Chicago and we’ll have had a good trip.”

This has not been a good trip for Orel Hershiser, who was counted out in the second inning in St. Louis last week--the shortest stint of his big-league pitching career--and labored through five innings here.

But the Dodgers scored five runs in the first three innings off Pirate starter Rick Reuschel, two on Ken Landreaux’s first home run since May 27. And relievers Tom Niedenfuer and Ken Howell, who should consider getting paid by the appearance, held off the Pirates, with Howell getting the save for the third straight game.

Could it be that the Dodger bullpen, which at times has been mistaken for Forest Lawn, is coming back to life?

“It better,” Cabell said. “We can’t win if we don’t have a bullpen. They’ve been struggling on and off all year. It’s about time somebody got hot in there.

“If not, who’s going to get screamed on this winter?”

Hershiser, rewarded handsomely last winter when he won $1 million in the baseball lottery called arbitration, came out after giving up six hits, three walks and four runs, three of the runs earned. But he still picked up win No. 9 in 16 decisions.

Hershiser’s good buddy, ex-Dodger Sid Bream, hastened the pitcher’s departure in the fifth by singling in the Pirates’ third run, then stealing the fourth with a brazen theft of third that caught ex-Pirate Bill Madlock completely by surprise. Madlock was nowhere near the bag when catcher Mike Scioscia threw the ball into left field for an error, allowing Bream to score.

Bream, who had walked and scored in the Pirate second but also had let Scioscia’s ground ball get through his legs for a Dodger run in the third, said he noticed a difference in Hershiser. And Bream wasn’t talking about the pitcher’s bank account.

“He’s not letting go,” Bream said. “He’s choking his curveball (gripping it too hard) and he’s now trying to emphasize turning the ball over. He doesn’t have the velocity he had.”

Bream said he personally planned to pass on his observations, now that the Pirates won’t face Hershiser again this season.

“It’s been a pressure year for him,” Bream said. “He signed the big contract. Normally, Orel has a cockiness about him. That’s why people don’t like him when he’s on the mound.

“It doesn’t look like he has that now. He’s just pushing the ball up there.”

Hershiser, whose earned-run average over the last two months is 6.00, wasn’t pushing any panic buttons.

“You’re waiting for me to tell you how bad I was,” he said to reporters gathered around his cubicle. “Well, I’m not going to.

“The positive signs are there, even if the results weren’t. I was falling behind hitters, but it was with balls in the dirt, low balls. All my mistakes in the past have been high. . . . I felt like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, I guess.”

Manager Tom Lasorda is still in the dark, however.

“He just did not pitch good, the way he’s capable of pitching,” Lasorda said.

Meanwhile, Dodger first baseman Len Matuszek, 8 for 37 in his last dozen games, figured he was capable of doing more at the plate. The solution, he decided, was to have some fun in batting practice.

It must have worked, because Matuszek had three hits. He singled in a run in the first, doubled and scored in the third, and set up what proved to be the game-winning run with a base hit in the eighth after Bill Madlock had walked.

Scioscia followed Matuszek’s eighth-inning single with a sacrifice fly that scored pinch-runner Jeff Hamilton, making it 6-4.

Niedenfuer, who has pitched in four of the last five games, gave up a run on pinch-hitter Mike Diaz’s pinch double in the bottom of the eighth, Niedenfuer’s third inning of work.

But Howell entered and, as he had done the night before, got Pirate rookie Barry Bonds on a called third strike. He then worked a 1-2-3 ninth.

Dodger hitting instructor Ben Hines said: “Bill Virdon (the Pirate hitting coach) said to me, ‘Barry’s a good young player but a bad umpire.’ ”

Like Cabell, Matuszek didn’t find anything demeaning about the Dodgers winning at the expense of the Cardinals and Pirates.

“Are we supposed to feel bad about beating up on the bottom teams in the East?” Matuszek said. “We have to try to find something in our own team, and find it on a consistent basis.

“When we do, I don’t care who we play, even the Mets. But we haven’t come close to that yet. . . . “We came close to folding there for a while, but we’re playing better. The bullpen’s done a great job, the defense is doing well--and the offense, we have to do anything we can to score runs.

“As long as we don’t beat ourselves, our pitching should keep us close for those one-run games. And Lord knows, we’ve had enough practice in those.”

Dodger Notes Ken Landreaux’s third-inning home run, which came after Steve Sax was hit in the side by Pirate pitcher Rick Reuschel, ended an 0-for-14 string by the Dodger center fielder. . . . Len Matuszek was thrown out twice on the bases. In the first inning, he attempted to score from first on Mike Scioscia’s single. Bill Madlock scored ahead of him, and when center fielder Barry Bonds’ throw got by catcher Tony Pena, who also had to cope with a collision with Madlock, Matuszek tried to score, too. But Matuszek said he failed to see Reuschel backing up the play and was tagged out by the Pirate pitcher. In the eighth, Matuszek was thrown out by right fielder Joe Orsulak when he tried to stretch a single into a double. . . . Madlock, on his collision with Pena, which knocked the mask off the catcher’s face: “I wasn’t going to slide because my ankle’s been hurting and I didn’t want to get it jammed. So I hit him with my upper body, because that’s the only part of me that’s not hurt.” . . . Dodger Manager Tom Lasorda, who has been filling in for third-base coach Joe Amalfitano, on whether he intends to coach third as long as the Dodgers keep winning: “I’ll leave it up to my players. If they want me back out there, I’ll be there.” Amalfitano, who had flown back to Los Angeles after the death of an aunt, is expected to be back with the team today. . . . Steve Sax flung his bat to the backstop after plate umpire Billy Williams turned a deaf ear to Sax’s pleas that his seventh-inning grounder struck his foot first. “The ball had a big scuff on it, but it wasn’t blue,” said Sax, who thought shoe polish might convince the umpire. “He said it could have been the plate. But it hit me right in the foot.” Replays seemed to verify Sax’s description. . . . Greg Brock, who has not been in the starting lineup since undergoing arthroscopic surgery on his left knee June 24, may be ready as soon as tonight.