Langston Shuts Down Padres in His Expo Debut

Ever since last winter, the Padres had longed for the day when Mark Langston would pitch at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

That day finally came Sunday, but Langston was wearing the wrong uniform.

The Padres had done all they could to acquire the left-handed Langston, 28, who had been placed on sale by the Seattle Mariners because his $1.3-million-a-year contract will run out at the end of the season. But he wound up with the Montreal Expos Thursday in a deal for three young pitchers, and the Padres suffered the additional indignity of being the first National League team to face him.

The 10-2 score by which the Expos humiliated the Padres only began to tell how dominant Langston was. He pitched one-hit ball for six innings, and didn’t give up a run until his working margin had reached 8-0. He left after eight innings with a four-hitter and 12 strikeouts, and one of the two Padre runs was unearned.

Granted, the Padres did a lot to embarrass themselves in front of a packed house of 48,023, lured in large measure by a postgame concert by the Beach Boys.

The pitching of Eric Show and Dave Leiper was a perfect match for the Padres’ anemic hitting, and Leiper made a terrible situation worse with a throw to third base following a rundown that ranked with the wildest on record.

Even a member of the Padre coaching staff got into the act. Sandy Alomar Sr., directing traffic at third base, put a fitting finish to the lamentable performance by sending Carmelo Martinez home from second base on Tim Flannery’s single with the Padres eight runs behind. Martinez was an easy game-ending out.

Afterward, Martinez summed things up by saying, “I hope the Beach Boys put on a better show.”

As Martinez suspected, the second half of the doubleheader was far more entertaining than the baseball game. Still, anyone with a keen eye for pitching had to be impressed by Langston. And anyone with the Padres’ interests at heart had to wonder how good they would be if they had landed him.

From the time Langston reached an impasse in contract negotiations with the Mariners, he had been the object of a manhunt that spread over both major leagues. Since he could have become a free agent this fall, the Mariners couldn’t wait to unload him.

Of course, the Expos will lose Langston if they can’t sign him, but as Manager Buck Rodgers put it, “We’re going for it in ’89. Anything after that will be a bonus.”

Since Langston is a native of San Diego--he moved to Santa Clara at the age of 4--and has expressed displeasure over going to Montreal, there is still hope among Padre diehards that he will come here eventually. However, Padre Manager Jack McKeon is not among the optimists.

“I have to think that if they’re trying to win a pennant, he’ll be with them quite a while,” McKeon said. “Maybe if they’re out of the race by September, we might see another deal, but I doubt if that will happen.”

Of all people, the only San Diego player to get a hit off Langston in the first six innings was Show. The Padre pitcher took advantage of one of Langston’s few mistakes by lining a double to right field in the third.

Even on that count, though, Langston had the last laugh. This was the first time he had ever batted in the majors because of the designated-hitter rule used in the American League. And he got the first hit of his career--also his first run batted in--in his fourth and last time at bat. It was a single to center off Leiper.

“That hit definitely made my day,” Langston said. “It was a pretty wild experience. It looked pretty ugly. I was just trying to put the ball in play. Now I can put it on my mantel.”

Langston is a switch-hitter, and his hit came on his first swing batting right-handed.

As for his pitching, he said, “I was really excited to be with a new team and with a big crowd. The guys went right out and scored some runs, so I could take a deep breath. We got the crowd out of it real early. It was my job to keep them out.”

Langston probably could have finished without difficulty, but he said, “I was getting a little tired. I really didn’t want to pitch the ninth, because I don’t like to go over 130 pitches (He threw 138). If it had been a close game, it would have been different.”

Rodgers offered a second reason for calling in closer Tim Burke, who has nine saves, to finish the game.”

“Burke hadn’t worked in almost a week,” Rodgers said. “I wanted to give him an inning to keep him sharp.”

Show (6-5) was gunning for a Padre record of 93 victories--he is tied with Randy Jones--but it became apparent in a hurry that he wasn’t going to get it. He yielded one run in the second and two in the fourth, then served up a three-run homer to Tim Raines in the fifth. By that time, the frustrated fans were booing loudly and often.

Tim Wallach was the Expos’ big bomber, tying a club record with three doubles.

How good was Langston? Just ask some of the Padres.

Flannery is a left-handed hitter who normally plays only against right-handed pitchers. But he was pressed into service because of Randy Ready’s leg injury, and looked back on it as quite an experience.

“Any left-hander is tough for me,” Flannery said. “Even Jimmy Allen, our batting-practice pitcher, gives me trouble. But Langston is one of the toughest I’ve ever seen. He’s always ahead of you, so you’re always hitting defensively.”

Jack Clark said, “He’s like a left-handed Dwight Gooden. He’s a great pitcher--not a good one, a great one.”

Padre Notes

The 10 runs scored by the Expos set a season record for Padre opponents. The previous high was nine. Said Padre Manager Jack McKeon: “This was our first blowout all year.” It came on the first anniversary of McKeon’s debut as manager after the firing of Larry Bowa. . . . Expo Manager Buck Rodgers said the trade for Mark Langston couldn’t have been made but for a surplus of talent in the Montreal farm system. “It’s a tribute to our scouting and farm department that we’ve developed players other clubs want.”