Marshall Ends Tudor’s No-Hit Bid in 8th : Dodgers Lose but, After 13 Innings, Finally Get Hit Off Cardinal Starter

This time, the Dodgers had sole responsibility for trying to break up St. Louis pitcher John Tudor’s no-hitter. Unlike last Sunday, when Tudor aborted his no-hit bid after six innings to avoid injury, there would not be a last-minute reprieve from the Cardinals.

After a remarkable display of dominance that lasted a total of 13 innings over two games, Tudor finally allowed a hit--to Mike Marshall--and a tying run--knocked in by Steve Sax--in the eighth inning Saturday night at Busch Stadium.

Not long after Tudor’s departure, though, the Cardinals came back to score a run in the bottom of the ninth inning, due to two defensive nonplays and shaky relief pitching, and eke out a 2-1 win over the Dodgers in a game with almost as many pertinent angles as hits.

There was the main story line, revolving around Tudor’s renewed bid for a no-hitter, foiled by Marshall after Tudor had faced 41 batters without giving up a hit, dating to last Sunday’s six-inning no-hitter.

Then, there were the subplots:

--The confiscation of Mickey Hatcher’s bat in the fifth inning, and the unusual procedure of taping the suspected cork-filled bat to the screen behind home plate. Plate umpire Joe West said the bat will be X-rayed today to determine if Hatcher had doctored it.

“There was a black spot on the ball every time it hit the bat, and there was a bubble on top of the bat,” West said. “We noticed it (Friday night), too. We’ll probably X-ray it (today).”

Hatcher denied knowledge of any potential tampering with the bat, a Louisville Slugger painted black.

--The admission of West that he may have blown a called third strike on Marshall with two out in the ninth inning and Alfredo Griffin on second base with the go-ahead run. It was the second time in a week an umpire had admitted he has erred.

The two significant nonplays by the shaky Dodger defense began when Pedro Guerrero fumbled a grounder and ended with the weak throw by left fielder Kirk Gibson on Terry Pendleton’s shallow sacrifice fly ball off reliever Jay Howell that scored Willie McGee with the game-winning run.

As Gibson’s one-bounce throw sailed short and wide of the plate, enabling McGee to score easily, the Dodgers’ four-game winning streak was over, and they were in no mood to discuss any of what transpired.

“I just didn’t make the play,” Gibson said. “I made a (lousy) throw. So, that’s it. Game’s over.”

This one, however, probably will be talked about for a while.

If baseball rulesmakers were more lenient, perhaps they might have been coerced to give Tudor special dispensation and let him carry over his six-inning no-hitter from last week into Saturday’s game.

That way, Tudor would have had a complete, nine-inning no-hitter after the third inning Saturday, and Dodger hitters still would have had six less-pressure-filled innings to try to figure out Tudor.

Given an 80-pitch limit by Manager Whitey Herzog to protect his left shoulder, Tudor entered the eighth on Saturday having thrown 70 pitches. Even if Tudor had exceeded the limit, which he did by four pitches, Herzog had agreed to leave him in until he gave up a hit.

Tudor had an 0-and-1 count on Marshall when the Dodger first baseman lined a single to left. Hatcher then moved Marshall to second with a single to center, and two outs later, pinch-hitter Sax singled in the tying run.

“He’s a great pitcher,” Marshall said. “He has about eight different pitches and never throws the same pitch twice. I hit something of his soft variety, something that he turned over. I wasn’t worried about the no-hitter. We still had a chance to win the ball game.”

For the longest time, the Dodgers appeared to have no clue whatsoever in figuring out Tudor. As if the Dodger embarrassment weren’t profound enough, West confiscated Hatcher’s bat and had Cardinal officials affix it to the screen behind home plate. The umpires wanted the bat in their sight because of the Cardinals’ recent history of X-raying the bats of the New York Mets’ Howard Johnson before the umpires could officially inspect it.

The dangling bat seemingly was taunting the Dodgers. “The last thing I’m going to do is use a corked bat--maybe Louisville sent it to the wrong Hatcher,” Hatcher quipped, referring to Houston’s Billy Hatcher, guilty of using a corked bat last season. “I had trouble enough against Tudor that any bat wouldn’t help.”

Hatcher said that West gave him back the bat after the game, but that the bat will be X-rayed today.

The Cardinals did not score a run off Dodger starter Tim Leary until the seventh inning, although Leary worked out of a bases-loaded, no-out jam in the third. In the seventh, McGee singled, stole second and continued to third on catcher Rick Dempsey’s wild throw. From there, McGee scored on Tom Brunansky’s sacrifice fly.

Marshall and Tom Lasorda were incensed at West’s call in the top of the ninth, when reliever--and eventual winner--Todd Worrell’s low fastball was called for strike three.

“What the . . . good does it do us now,” said Lasorda, told that West admitted the mistake. “When (West) told me the pitch (was a strike), I almost fainted.”

The Cardinals did better in their ninth-inning rally. Dodger reliever Jesse Orosco, who retired the side in the eighth, gave up an infield hit to Ozzie Smith that Guerrero could not handle. After McGee forced Smith, Brunansky singled to right off the end of his bat to move McGee to third.

In came Howell, who walked Bob Horner. Pendleton then lofted a fly ball about 225 feet down the left-field line, deep enough to score McGee for the winning run.

“I thought McGee might have left early,” Gibson said. “But it’s all irrelevant. We lost. What good does it do now?”

Dodger Notes

Despite leading the National League in hitting with a .377 average entering Saturday night’s game, catcher Mike Scioscia was rested against left-hander John Tudor. Rick Dempsey got the start. Scioscia has not started in 4 of the last 6 games in which left-handed pitchers started against the Dodgers. But Manager Tom Lasorda said he is not platooning Scioscia and Dempsey. “I don’t like to see Scioscia catch every day,” Lasorda said. “I want him to catch only 140 games, if possible. If, God forbid, Scioscia gets hurt, I want Dempsey to be ready to start. He needs the playing time.”

There also was some question about outfielder Mike Davis’ reason for not playing. Davis, who came out of Friday night’s win because of soreness in his left ankle, said before Saturday’s game that he would test the ankle before deciding whether he could play. But Lasorda said he wanted to give Davis the night off, anyway. r Assistant trainer Charlie Strasser said playing on artificial turf for the first time Friday night has brought on soreness in Davis’ ankle, which was first injured on March 15. . . . Steve Sax took batting practice and ground balls at second base before pulling himself from the lineup because of lingering cold symptoms. Sax has had a chest and head cold for more than a week. . . . Don Sutton (1-2) opposes the Cardinals’ Jose DeLeon (2-2) today at 11:15 a.m., PDT.