Cloud Follows Dodgers After 12-5 Defeat

What had been an unseasonably pleasant day on this trip for the Dodgers, in terms of both weather and baseball, turned bleak in a hurry Friday at Wrigley Field.

After being finished off, 12-5, by the Chicago Cubs in the completion of Thursday’s suspended game early in the afternoon, the Dodgers were rolling along with a three-run lead and Orel Hershiser pitching amid the warmth and sunshine in Friday’s regularly scheduled game.

Then, black clouds again rolled in off the lakeshore, as they had on Thursday, noticeably darkening the Dodgers’ mood and performance.

Reliever Ken Howell was called upon to protect a lead that had dwindled to one run, but in a steady rain with two out and two on in the bottom of the ninth, he gave up a double to Dave Martinez that scored Jim Sundberg to tie the score, 4-4.

A come-from-behind Cub win was averted--or at least postponed--when shortstop Mariano Duncan’s relay throw was in time for catcher Mike Scioscia to tag out Manny Trillo at home plate on a close play.

Moments thereafter, players scattered for shelter in the dugout, and the grounds crew quickly covered the field with a tarpaulin as the drizzle was transformed to a downpour. One hour 31 minutes later, the rain had lessened, but the game was suspended with the teams tied.

Friday’s game will be resumed today at 11:30 a.m. PDT with Martinez on third base and Paul Noce at bat with two out.

Manager Tom Lasorda announced afterward that Howell will be replaced on the mound by Matt Young.

The Dodgers, losers of five straight and eight of their last 10 games, obviously are in a precarious position for yet another loss when Friday’s game is resumed.

That’s why Lasorda said he was hoping the game would be ruled a rainout, which would have resulted in the game being replayed in its entirety as part of a doubleheader today.

The umpires ruled that since the rain had lessened and the field was playable, a rainout was not viable. But they chose to suspend it because of darkness. Both managers agreed to waive the rule that states a game has to restart before being suspended. Lasorda said he grudgingly agreed.

“I was reluctant to agree with it (the suspension ruling),” Lasorda said. “As tired as my pitching staff is, I’d still rather have them play another nine innings with a tie game than face this situation. If I hadn’t agreed, (the umpires) would’ve had me put the players out on the field, then they would’ve called it. So, I had no choice, really.

“If that guy (Noce or a Cub pinch-hitter) gets a hit, it’s all over. With a rainout, we got a lot better chance of winning it than if it’s suspended.”

It looked as though the Dodgers had a reasonable chance of beating the Cubs and the bad weather, but both hit hard at about the same time.

Hershiser gave up two runs on four singles in the eighth inning, narrowing the Dodger lead to 4-3, before Howell entered with two outs and struck out Keith Moreland with Jerry Mumphrey on third base.

But Howell ran into his own problems in the ninth, even though the conditions seemingly were in his favor. The darkness made it difficult for hitters to see the ball, but the Cubs managed to handle Howell easily enough.

Sundberg opened the ninth with a single to right, then Howell walked Trillo, who ran the count to 3 and 2. Howell, coming off three scoreless innings in St. Louis, then struck out pinch-hitter Gary Matthews, bringing up Martinez with two out.

Howell was a strike away from his first save of the season when Martinez hit a shot that sliced through the rain and hit at the base of the wall in left-center.

Newly acquired Dodger outfielder Tito Landrum, a defensive replacement for Pedro Guerrero in left field, retrieved the ball and threw to Duncan in shallow left. Duncan’s throw to Scioscia was a little high, but Scioscia caught it and put the tag on Trillo, who slid between Scioscia’s legs.

Umpire Bob Engel called Trillo out. Television replays were inconclusive, but Scioscia says he is certain that Trillo did not slide under the tag.

“I thought he was out,” Scioscia said. “The only question was that Mariano’s throw was a little high, but I didn’t think (Trillo’s) leg hit the plate.”

Howell expressed mixed emotions at his late-inning performance. On the one hand, he saved Hershiser in the eighth, but nearly lost it in the ninth.

“For a guy (Martinez) to hit the ball in conditions like that is pretty unbelievable,” Howell said. “But I’ve got to save a game like this. Orel pitched his rear end off and we had to come out of it tied. It’s not right.

“We just got to keep our heads up and keep pushing and it’ll come. The most important thing is to come back tomorrow, get that third out and then score a run. That sounds kind of funny, doesn’t it? Get the third out tomorrow .”

Young, warming up in the bullpen throughout Howell’s stint on Friday, has that assignment this afternoon.

Will it be a restless night, Matt?

“I’m just going to pitch and not worry about it,” Young said. “Hope everything works out all right. I get in trouble when I start thinking.”

Lasorda gets depressed when he thinks of the Dodgers’ long week, which included a rain out Monday in St. Louis, followed by consecutive late-night doubleheaders, then consecutive suspended games here. “Me, I’m not playing and I’m exhausted,” Lasorda said. “These guys are out there all the time, and they’ve got to be hurting.”

Until Friday’s late-inning showers, which coincided with the Cubs’ comeback, the Dodgers appeared in decent shape.

After failing to score a run in the final 2 innings of suspended game from Thursday, giving Rick Honeycutt a club-record eighth straight loss, the Dodgers regrouped and came back for the regularly scheduled game playing much better.

They scored an unearned run in the first inning against Cub starter Greg Maddux, who made the error that scored the run. With John Shelby on second, Guerrero on first and one out, Mike Marshall hit a broken-bat grounder back to Maddux.

Maddux’s throw to second to initiate a potential double play went behind shortstop Dave Brumley and bounced into center field, allowing Shelby to score.

An inning later, the Dodgers made it 2-0 in a more conventional manner. With two out, Hershiser bounced a soft single down the right-field line that scored Franklin Stubbs, who had tripled.

At that point, it didn’t look as though Hershiser would need more than two runs.

He gave up a solo home run to Jerry Mumphrey to lead off the bottom of the second. Over the next five innings, Hershiser gave up four singles, but the Cubs did not stage a serious threat.

Guerrero’s solo home run in the top of the eighth gave the Dodgers a 4-2 lead and, as Lasorda said, “it looked like we had it in the bag.”

But those dark clouds were bearing down on the Dodgers, a harbinger of the unfortunate events--for the Dodgers--to come.

Gary Matthews, 37, who sparked the Cubs’ 1984 drive to the National League East title, was traded Friday to the Seattle Mariners for a minor league player to be named.