Padres, of All People, Sweep Dodgers in Doubleheader

After 6 1/2 hours, 38 hits and 7 errors at Dodger Stadium Friday night, baseball in Southern California is sorely in need of a reality check. Are the San Diego Padres for real?

Check that.

Are the Dodgers for real?

The results of a doubleheader between the National League West’s first- and fifth-place teams are in, and we hope you have a good grip on your coffee.

The fifth-place Padres won. Both games.

Before a crowd that eventually grew to 33,649, the Padres won the first game, 7-4, and then survived the second game, 4-3, to produce some strange developments.

First, the Dodgers are still in first place. Yes, the Houston Astros were also playing a doubleheader, and yes, even though it was against the only division team worse than the Padres, the Atlanta Braves, the Astros were swept and remained one game behind.

“Amazing,” said Dodger catcher Rick Dempsey, “that we can play this bad and still be in first place.”

It was a night for Dodger Bad, but also Padre Smart, and together they accounted for two victories for a team that came into the game with only five road wins.

In Game 1, the Padres won by scoring five runs in one inning, which included two sacrifice flies and an attempted sacrifice bunt.

In Game 2, the Dodgers assisted on three of the four Padre runs with errors, and then loaded the bases with one out in the eighth but couldn’t get the potential tying run home.

“You can write about these games pretty easy,” Kirk Gibson said after going 1 for 5 with two errors. “It was a terrible day.”

Having already incited the Padres to complete a three-game sweep of the Dodgers last weekend in San Diego, giving the Padres five straight wins and seven out of nine against their neighbors to the north, Gibson would say no more.

“After what I’ve heard and read in the newspapers in San Diego, I’d be an idiot to say anything,” Gibson said.

Dodger Manager Tom Lasorda also kept quiet, spending most of the postgame interview session staring into nothing.

The Padres, 6 1/2 games behind the Dodgers after starting the month 11 1/2 back, were doing no such thing.

“There is a weird feeling around here,” said infielder Tim Flannery, smiling weirdly as he talked about a team that has won eight of nine games. “It’s a feeling that’s starting to build. It’s like, we expect to win. It’s the first time we’ve felt that way around here in three years.”

And when the Dodgers have played the Padres lately, observed Tony Gwynn, it’s been as if they’ve expected something else entirely.

“I’m not going to say we have a better team . . . but right now we’re a better team,” Gwynn said. “We are out-executing them. We are getting the bigger hits.

“I think they feel that man for man they might have a better club, and should be beating us. So they are putting too much pressure on themselves. They are trying to do too much.”

Gwynn laughed, only as one who is throwing a surprise party can laugh.

“Look at us, we’re relaxed,” he said. “On that last home stand, we hit .226 and won nine games. What does that say for the way we are playing?”

The eighth inning of the second game essentially told the evening’s story. With the Padres leading, 4-3, the Dodgers loaded the bases with one out against reliever Lance McCullers.

Up stepped Jeff Hamilton. Five pitches later, he struck out swinging.

Up stepped pinch-hitter Mike Scioscia. Six pitches later, he weakly popped the ball to shallow center, where it was chased down by shortstop Dickie Thon.

“At this point,” Dempsey said later, “all we can do is forget.”

Following that first-game loss, the Dodgers locked their clubhouse for 10 minutes. It didn’t work.

Just look at the second-game blunders, which cost the Dodgers everything.

In the third inning, left fielder Gibson fielded a bouncing RBI single by Gwynn. Whoops. The ball popped out of his glove, and a second run scored.

In the sixth, Gibson fielded a single by Thon and threw home in pursuit of Benito Santiago. Look out. The ball soared over catcher Dempsey’s head, and the Padres scored another run.

In the seventh, with two runners on base, John Kruk hit into a double-play grounder. Oops. Shortstop Dave Anderson dropped the ball at second, and Kruk was safe at first while Randy Ready was safe at third.

Carmelo Martinez then grounded into another possible double play. Heads up. Second baseman Steve Sax threw the ball high and wild, and Ready scored the Padres’ fourth run.

It didn’t help that the Dodgers again couldn’t mess with Dennis Rasmussen, who threw a five-hitter against them June 11. He allowed 3 runs in 6 innings and gave way to the hard-throwing McCullers, who survived equally well.

In Game 1, the Padres demonstrated that Manager Jack McKeon’s brand of baseball means you can hit into three double plays, drop five balls in the field for three errors . . . and still win if you do the things that nobody notices.

The Dodgers played well for five innings, but then the Padres got five runs in the sixth as starter Tim Leary allowed three hits, including a two-run triple by Gwynn, a sacrifice and a walk without getting anybody out.

Leary threw a three-hitter against the Padres two months ago, then held them to 2 runs in 6 innings last weekend.

“He was different then,” said Gwynn of Leary, who fell to 5-5 with an ERA above 3.00 (3.13) for the first time this season. “He was making those tough pitches back then. Today, he was bearing down too much. He lost his composure. The wheels came off.”

Tim Crews came on to relieve Leary in the sixth, an inning that included sacrifice flies by Padres Keith Moreland and Chris Brown, and a sacrifice bunt by Marvell Wynne that was so perfect it turned into a base hit that did in the Dodgers.

Dodger Notes

Pitcher Fernando Valenzuela will return today from his father’s funeral in Etchohuaquila, Mexico, and make his scheduled start in Sunday’s first game, according to his agent Tony DeMarco, who spoke with Dodger officials Friday afternoon. Valenzuela’s father, Avelino, died of cancer Wednesday morning at his home, and Valenzuela, who had started Tuesday night in Atlanta, immediately left the club to join his family. He had not been heard from until Friday, when DeMarco contacted Dodger Executive Vice President Fred Claire with the news.

The chances of Pedro Guerrero returning from the disabled list Monday as scheduled are officially slim and none. Guerrero stopped by Dodger Stadium for treatment on his sore back Friday. Team trainer Bill Buhler said Guerrero feels better than he did while he was in the hospital last week, but “he’s still not where he wants to be.” Guerrero’s return on Monday, said Buhler, is “questionable.” . . . Pitcher Ken Howell was nursing a sore knee Friday after his home-plate collision with Dale Murphy in Atlanta Thursday, but Buhler said he would be available to make his regularly scheduled start Monday night.

Shorstop Alfredo Griffin will finally rid himself of that bulky cast next Wednesday during a visit with Dr. Charles Ashworth. Dodger officials are estimating his return to the field to be another 7 to 10 days after that because of muscle atrophy. . . . Gone But Not Forgotten Dept.: Triple-A shortstop Mariano Duncan was in town Friday visiting Dr. Ralph Gambardella for treatment of a stress fracture of the first rib on his right side. He should return to the Albuquerque club Monday, but won’t be ready for action for another couple of weeks.

Forty former Dodgers will return to Dodger Stadium today at 11:30 a.m. for an old-timers’ game. It will match a team managed by Roy Campanella against a team managed by Leo Durocher. Among the participants are players ranging from Joe Black and John Roseboro to Jay Johnstone and Steve Garvey, making his old-timer debut. . . . Right fielder Mike Marshall was a late scratch from the second-game starting lineup with a strained left elbow injured on an eighth-inning throw in the first game. The throw nailed Padre shortstop Garry Templeton at the plate. The injury enabled Mike Davis to make his first start since June 5 in Cincinnati. . . . Davis’ double in the seventh inning of the first game was his fifth hit in his last 47 at-bats (.106).

Marshall went 2 for 4 in the first game, making him 7 for 17 in his last four games and giving him a .366 average (15 for 41) since taking over in right field 10 games earlier. . . . The doubleheader was worked by only three umpires. Just before the first game, scheduled first base umpire Ed Montague was told that his father was ill, and he quickly left the stadium. He’ll be replaced today by vacation umpire Larry Poncino.