Pittsburgh Prolongs Padres’ Stall, 4-3 : TO PAGE 17B

Padre Manager Jack McKeon winced when the words tumbled out of his mouth, but after losing for the third consecutive time Saturday night, there was no use masking the frustration.

“This is reminding me of last year,” McKeon said. “This is exactly what happened to us last year.”

The Padres, 4-3 losers to the Pittsburgh Pirates, sunk to the .500 mark with a 9-9 record, already five games behind the first-place Cincinnati Reds.

It’s too early to panic, of course, but McKeon is becoming irritated at the course this season is taking.

The Padres have become masters of the long ball, hitting three home runs for the first time since Sept. 17, 1989, including an inside-the-park homer by Bip Roberts. But it doesn’t do you a whole lot of good when no one is on base.

Of the Padres’ 20 home runs this season, 13 have been with the bases empty, including all three Saturday. It doesn’t help matters when you collect just five other hits, but as McKeon will tell you, it’s suicide when you collect just one walk.

The only walk the Padres drew this night was when Jack Clark fell to the ground to avoid Pirate starter Bob Walk’s head-high ball four; they have just four walks in their past three games. In the past four, the offense has gone completely sour, scoring just 11 runs while batting .214.

And you wonder why the Padres are losing?

“We had some guys going up there saying, ‘Thou Shalt Not Walk,’ ” McKeon said. “This guy here (Bob Walk) usually walks four or five a game, and all we got is one. That’s not going to do it. You don’t want to take away their aggressiveness, but you’ve got to be disciplined, too.

“Our guy (starter Andy Benes) walked back-to-back guys tonight. It’d be tough to walk back-to-back guys on our club. We must have had four or five cases of guys swinging at pitches over their head tonight.”

And even though the Padres had the three home runs and had runners in scoring position in each of the last four innings, they still could not win.

“We had plenty of opportunities didn’t we?” McKeon said. “I don’t know, it seems like we’re still too anxious. We’re not patient. That’s the frustrating thing.

“What have we got to do different? We’ll pray tomorrow. We’ll pray a little harder.”

The Padres found themselves trailing, 4-0, in the fourth inning when Benes was knocked out of the game after just 3 2/3 innings, his shortest outing in the big leagues.

But slowly, they came back.

In fact, it looked as if Padre catcher Benito Santiago might do it single-handedly for a while, homering in the fifth inning, hitting a single in the seventh and hitting a double in the ninth. But the only time he scored was on his own homer.

Santiago might have been spurred by the actions of Pirate outfielder Barry Bonds before the game. It was Bonds who stole second Friday night, then teased Santiago before the game, saying, “I told you son, you’re not going to throw me out, not from your knees, not from your knees.”

Bonds kept smiling as he talked. Santiago looked towards him and said, “I heard you.”

Santiago wasn’t smiling.

Said one Padre: “They’re starting to get a little cocky, aren’t they? I wouldn’t be getting Benny mad if I was him.”

But in the end, it was the Pirates laughing again, winning their fifth consecutive game and ninth of their past 10.

If the Padres were looking for anything good out of this game, at least, they said, they were able to come back.

They began with Jack Clark’s bases-empty home run in the fourth, just his second hit in the past five games. Of course, it’s tough to hit when you’re being walked nine times during that stretch.

The next inning, it was Santiago’s turn with a one-out, solo homer over the center-field fence. It was his fourth homer of the season, a feat he hadn’t accomplished until June 5 last year.

And then, it was Roberts’ turn in the sixth. Of course, Roberts’ was a little more interesting than his predecessors.

Leading off the inning, he hit a 1-2 pitch off the top of the center-field fence, and the ball rolled back into play. Center fielder Andy Van Slyke crashed into the fence trying to make the catch, and then took a swipe at the ball but missed. Right fielder Bobby Bonilla came over to help, but it was too late.

Roberts was being waved home by third-base coach Sandy Alomar, and he crossed home plate standing up for the Padres’ 10th career inside-the-park home run. The last time it was accomplished was July 29, 1988, by Tony Gwynn against the Cincinnati Reds.

The last time Roberts accomplished it?

“I think it was probably in Little League,” he said.

The Padres threatened to score more in the sixth when Roberto Alomar followed with a single to right, went to second on Gwynn’s ground out and reached third on Walk’s wild pitch.

There was still just one out, and Clark stepped to the plate with Joe Carter standing on deck. Clark unleashed several cuts, all resulting in foul balls, before finally settling on a walk. He now has struck out 21 times and walked 19 times, and is well on his way to becoming the first player in major league history to combine for a total of 300 walks and strikeouts.

Now, all Carter needed was to just hit the ball out of the infield to score Alomar from third, but he hit a slow roller to first baseman Sid Bream, who picked the ball up, fired home and got Alomar easily.

Fred Lynn stepped up to the plate, but before he could take a swing, catcher Mike LaValliere and Walk huddled at the pitcher’s mound, determining how to pitch him. Whatever they said didn’t work. Lynn lined a 2-0 pitch to right field. Bonilla picked the ball up, and Sandy Alomar waved Clark home.

The Padres’ strategy worked perfectly, except for one flaw. They didn’t count on Bonilla making a pin-point throw to home plate, nailing Clark for the third out.

“Right now, they seem to be the ones doing everything right,” Roberts said. “They’re making the plays; we’re not.”

The Padres threatened again in the seventh, eighth and ninth innings, but each time came away empty.

“Well, at least we showed something positive with our effort tonight,” Benes said. “I sure can’t same the same.”

Benes, who opened the game by striking out Wally Backman on three pitches, never again was the same. He lasted just 3 2/3 innings, yielding seven hits and four runs.

It was his shortest outing in 14 major league starts, and the only time he had ever pitched fewer innnings in a professional start was June 22, 1989, when he yielded seven hits and seven earned runs in 2 1/3 innings against San Antonio.

But that was Benes’ first start since coming off the disabled list with tendinitis. This time, he was coming off a 13-3 victory over the San Francisco Giants in which he yielded just four hits over six innings.

Padre Notes

Padre pitcher Mark Grant was taking batting tips from first baseman Jack Clark before the game. Grant is obviously open to any suggestions. He has the lowest career batting average (.051, five for 98) of any active major league player. And teammate Bruce Hurst ranks third on the list with a .066 average (five for 76). “If you ever watch these guys take batting practice, you’ll see why,” said Padre pitching coach Pat Dobson, laughing. Each is safe, for now, from the all-time record for bad hitting. Ron Herbel, who pitched for the San Francisco Giants and Atlanta Braves, owned a career .029 average (six for 206).

It was quite a week for home runs: There was Cleveland Indians shortstop Felix Fermin hitting his first home run in 655 major league at-bats and 2,916 professional at-bats; Houston Astro infielder Casey Candaele hitting his first home run in three years; Seattle Mariner second baseman Harold Reynolds hitting his first home run in two years, and Padre third baseman Bip Roberts hitting the first two home runs of his career left-handed this week, one inside the park Saturday. But no one is celebrating a homer more than Padre pitcher Ed Whitson, who the first of his career Wednesday off Chicago’s Mike Bielecki. Whitson is having the home-run ball encased, and the bat he used to hit it also is being preserved, never to be used again. “I don’t know if I’ll ever have another,” Whitson said, “so I’m going to make the most of this one. You know, that’s the first time I ever used that bat, and it’s the last time I’ll use it. I’m going to have a one-bat bat-rack built in my house.” Who can blame Whitson for his euphoria? After all, he said, his last home run occurred 17 years ago when he was at Erwin, Tenn., High School.

Red Sox General Manager Lou Gorman has been telephoning teams, desperately looking for a starting pitcher. Boston has already used eight starters this season. He talked to Jack McKeon, Padre manager and vice president/baseball operations, about six weeks ago, asking if he was interested in reliever Lee Smith. McKeon said no, and they have not talked since. . . . Former Padre reliever Mark Davis, who took his Cy Young trophy to Kansas City after signing a four-year, $13 million contract with the Royals, is 0-1 with a 7.36 ERA this season, yielding six walks and striking out 10. After saving 44 games last year, he has just three this season and none since April 17. “He might be struggling,” Dobson said, “but I’ll tell you what, I’ll take him back any day.” . . . The 10 extra-base hits yielded Friday night were the most given up by the Padre pitching staff since April 22, 1984, when the Dodgers got 11 extra-base hits at Dodger Stadium. . . . Former Padre Carmelo Martinez hit his second game-winning home run in as many nights Saturday for Philadelphia. . . . The Padres will conclude their three-game series against the Pirates at 1:05 p.m. today. Dennis Rasmussen (1-0) and Doug Drabek (3-1) are the scheduled starters. The Padres are off Monday, then play the final two games of their 12-game home stand Tuesday and Wednesday against St. Louis. Whitson (2-0) and Bryn Smith (2-2) are the scheduled starters Tuesday, and Hurst (0-3) and Jose DeLeon (2-0) are scheduled Wednesday.