Dodgers Go Down Quietly : Baseball: They get only three singles off Smoltz as the Braves win, 4-0.

The Dodgers took a cue from one of their biggest fans Wednesday night.

Singer Kenny Rogers, a friend of Manager Tom Lasorda, knew when he had to fold ‘em--in the first inning.

“We let out a couple of ‘Y’all go Dodgers,’ and all of the Atlanta Braves’ fans around us wanted to beat us up,” he told several players in the clubhouse afterward. “So we quit.”

The Dodgers soon followed. They fell behind, 2-0, in the second inning and never caught up with Braves’ pitcher John Smoltz, getting just three singles in a 4-0 loss before 11,569 at Atlanta Stadium.

The Dodgers were just the team to fire up the usually quiet locals. Despite the presence of Kirk Gibson, who had one of the hits in his first start since straining his right groin muscle June 18, the offense looked hot and tired. And pitcher Tim Belcher again looked like someone else.

Appearing sluggish in the humid weather, Belcher completed the Dodgers six-game trip by blowing his second game on the trip, both of them important.

“I screwed up our six-game win streak in Cincinnati last Saturday, and I screwed up this . . . game tonight,” explained Belcher, who allowed three runs, two earned, in five innings.

“That doesn’t make me a very productive 1/25th of this team, does it? I’m not helping the team very much right now.”

He certainly isn’t helping his manager very much. Tom Lasorda is scheduled to be a guest on today’s taping of The Arsenio Hall Show. It’s hard to be hip when your team is so square. But he’s going to try.

“We just won six in a row, didn’t we?” he said after the Dodgers ended this trip at 2-4. “We did it once, we can do it again.”

Without Belcher, it could seem they can’t.

This was the sixth time in his last seven starts that the team has lost. He has not had a complete game since May 1. He has not thrown a shutout since a 1-0 win over San Diego on the second day of the season.

Many have said Belcher’s arm has never recovered from that game. Earlier this week Belcher agreed, saying he was suffering from an inflamed right shoulder. But he maintained that he can still pitch.

On Wednesday, as he fell to 5-6 with a 4.28 earned-run average, he would not use a medical excuse.

“The only thing hurting is me, hurting the team,” Belcher said. “And that’s all I will say about that.”

Many Dodgers don’t believe him.

“Just watch, he’s not throwing the ball past anybody,” said one. “We think he is hurting.”

With Dr. Frank Jobe scheduled to be at Dodger Stadium when the team returns Friday to begin a three-game series against St. Louis, an extensive examination will be available to Belcher if he desires one. “He said his shoulder felt fine tonight, and until he complains, we generally don’t do anything,” trainer Bill Buhler said. “He has to be the one to come to us.”

One view of Belcher’s problem can be found by comparing him to Smoltz, who recorded only the third shutout for the worst pitching staff in baseball.

Belcher entered the game unbeaten against the Braves in his career, at 3-0 with a 1.89 earned-run average. Smoltz entered the game winless against the Dodgers in his career, 0-3 with a 5.73 ERA.

But it was Smoltz who gave the Braves their first series win against the Dodgers in Atlanta since September, 1986.

Belcher allowed two runs in the second inning on a home run by Greg Olson, his sixth, and on wild pitch that scored Jeff Blauser, who had walked. Another walk cost Belcher him in the fourth, when Olson walked and scored on a triple by Blauser.

Smoltz, 5-6 with a 4.92 ERA, faced just 29 hitters, two over the minimum. His only trouble came in the seventh, when Stan Javier and Gibson singled with one out. Strikeouts by Eddie Murray and Hubie Brooks took care of that.

In five innings, Belcher threw 97 pitches. In nine innings, Smoltz threw 94.

“I’m too big and too proud to cry,” Belcher said. “And I won’t quit. So I guess I have to keep going out there every day.”

One thing that might help him is a consistent offense. After scoring 19 runs on 29 hits last weekend in Cincinnati, they scored just seven runs on 20 hits in Atlanta.

Murray and Brooks combined for nine hits in 45 at-bats on this trip, a .200 average. That is a hot streak compared to Juan Samuel, who was returned to the starting lineup at the beginning of the trip despite an zero-for-30 slump, and responded by going four for 22, a .182 average.

“This loss killed the whole trip,” Lenny Harris lamented. Then he shrugged and stated the painful truth.

“But we’ve been there before.”

Dodger Notes

Kal Daniels has a sprained back, and his condition was listed as day-to-day after a Magnetic Resonance Imaging examination in Los Angeles. “Backs are so funny, I’ve seen guys who couldn’t walk one day, (but) would be feeling 100% and ready to play the next day,” said Charlie Strasser, Dodger assistant trainer. “It’s all wait and see.” The Dodgers hope he can return for the home stand beginning Friday against St. Louis, as Daniels is batting .330 at home with seven home runs. He has hit .272 on the road with four home runs.

Third baseman Jeff Hamilton took batting practice for the first time since his arthroscopic shoulder surgery May 4. He said the shoulder felt tender, but said he could return to the lineup within a month. . . . Dodger relief pitcher Pat Perry began his second comeback this season by tossing on the sidelines. Perry has been out since June 3 with tendinitis in his surgically repaired left shoulder. . . . Third baseman Jim Presley returned to the Braves’ lineup, one day after missing a game because his mother, Lucinda Brazel, swore out a warrant for his arrest on charges of simple battery after a late-night altercation. Presley refused to comment.