BASEBALL / ROSS NEWHAN : It’s Possible That Cubs Will Pull a Reverse

Only one team in baseball history has gone from a league or division championship to last place the next season. The 1914-15 Philadelphia Athletics did it, taking some of the starch out of Connie Mack’s collar.

Now? Holy cow! The Chicago Cubs have a shot at it, creating glee among cynics who thought their National League East title last year was a fluke. General Manager Jim Frey disagrees, believing the Cubs got what they deserved in 1989 and had a good chance to repeat.

“I think we were justified in having high expectations, but you can’t predict injuries and other problems,” he said of the misfortune confronting the Cubs in 1990.

“In ’84 (when Frey managed the Cubs to a division title), we stayed healthy. Last year, we were healthy. Everyone knows football is a game of injuries, but baseball is even more so, because of the effect one or two players can have on a team.

“It’s been very frustrating, and it takes a lot of patience to live through a year like this.”

The critical breakdown has been in pitching. Rick Sutcliffe, Greg Maddux and Mike Bielecki combined for 54 victories last year. They had 20 through Thursday. Mitch Williams had 36 saves and a 2.64 earned-run average last year. He had 14 with a 1-8 record and a 3.75 ERA through Friday. The staff ERA of 3.34 last year is up almost a run to 4.29, having recently come down from 4.66 at the All-Star break.

Injuries have been a factor:

--Sutcliffe didn’t make his first start until Aug. 29 after surgery for torn shoulder cartilage. Did his absence put pressure on Maddux and Bielecki, who combined on a midseason winless streak spanning almost two months? Frey thinks there’s no question about it.

“People say how can one guy, how can a Sutcliffe, mean so much, and the answer is that everyone in baseball is out looking for a guy who can win 15 or 16 games and pitch 240 innings like Rick does,” Frey said. “Do the Dodgers miss (Orel) Hershiser? My guess is they miss him a lot--psychologically, if no other way.”

--Williams, The Wild Thing, was on the disabled list from June 12 to July 12 after knee surgery and has never found his relief groove of last season. Les Lancaster, who was effective in support of Williams with a 4-2 record, eight saves and a 1.36 ERA last year, was asked to shoulder more of the load and is 5-7 with a 5.09 ERA. The Cubs are experimenting in September by employing Williams as a starter, though they’re not sure where that will lead.

“Nothing creates more instability and heartbreak than consistently losing leads and games in the late innings, as we have this year,” Frey said. “We didn’t have a consistency in the bullpen and rotation to keep anything going.”

Sutcliffe’s absence and the ineffectiveness of Maddux and Bielecki compounded the free-agent loss of Scott Sanderson, who has won 16 games with the Oakland Athletics, but Frey believes the Cubs made a fair offer to Sanderson, considering his medical history and 33 victories of the previous five seasons.

Would Sanderson have won 16 games with the Cubs? That’s doubtful, considering the often unfriendly confines of Wrigley Field compared to the spacious Oakland Coliseum and the type of support he receives from the A’s.

Although Ryne Sandberg, Andre Dawson and Shawon Dunston have produced All-Star seasons, and Mark Grace has rebounded from a first half in which he had only two home runs and 32 runs batted in, the Cub offense has also been curtailed by injury.

Catcher Damon Berryhill, sidelined by rotator cuff surgery, played his first game on Sept. 1. Center fielder Jerome Walton, a leadoff hitter who stole 24 bases as the NL’s rookie of the year in 1989, missed seven weeks in midseason with a broken hand and has 13 steals.

In addition, the 92-RBI left-field platoon of Dwight Smith, who was runner-up to Walton in rookie voting, and Lloyd McClendon had only 34 RBIs before McClendon was recently traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates. Smith, a .324 hitter last season, is batting .266.

An ill wind at Wrigley? Definitely, but not entirely. The absence of Berryhill accelerated the development of the impressive Joe Girardi, giving the Cubs an option at a key position. Mike Harkey, in a rookie-of-the-year bid, was 12-6 before his latest bout with tendinitis, and Shawn Boskie, 23, was 5-6 before requiring minor elbow surgery.

First to last? A disconcerting possibility, but first to last to first is a possibility, too. Frey said he will be looking for a left-handed starting pitcher, a right-handed reliever and one more power hitter. There has been speculation that Terry Pendleton will leave the St. Louis Cardinals as a free agent and close the Cubs’ revolving door at third base. The first key: Removing the revolving door to the trainer’s room.

Len Dykstra began a weekend series in New York having lost 25 points off his batting average despite hitting .306 since the All-Star break. He had fallen a fraction behind the ghost of Willie McGee in his bid to become the first Phillie to win a batting title since Richie Ashburn in 1958.

Now with the Oakland Athletics, McGee left the St. Louis Cardinals with a .335 average and enough at-bats to qualify for the NL crown.

“It’s just a weird deal with McGee in the other league like that,” Dykstra said. “It’s nice knowing what I have to do and it’s not nice, too.

“It’s like he hit .335 from the day he was traded until the end of the season, and that’s not easy to do in September.”

Ben McDonald, 7-4 with the Baltimore Orioles, is getting the message. Wednesday night, he sent Alan Trammell of the Detroit Tigers scrambling away from a 95-m.p.h. fastball that hit the knob of Trammell’s bat, narrowly missing his left knuckles.

McDonald said he intends to deal with hitters who lean over the plate too much, as Trammell did. It’s a message McDonald first heard at Louisiana State, and which Oriole Manager Frank Robinson has been repeating.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Robinson said. “I like everything he does, but he might be a little more effective if he was a little wild at times.

“I’d like to see (opposing hitters) with their cleats above ground instead of getting a toehold.”

McDonald, Robinson added, is “way ahead” of both Sandy Koufax and Nolan Ryan at similar stages of their careers because of his better control.

The realities of a 162-game schedule continue to confront Seattle’s Ken Griffey Jr. as he struggles in the second half, the September headlines going to the senior Griffey, his father and Mariner teammate.

Junior remains among the American League leaders in hits, runs and total bases, but as of Friday he had hit .253 since the All-Star break with seven homers and 27 runs batted in, his overall average dipping to .299 with 19 homers and 67 RBIs. Quality numbers for a 20-year-old in his second season, but for The Natural?

“On top of last year, I think it’s another outstanding building block,” Manager Jim Lefebvre said. “He’s a little tired right now, but he’s shown immeasurable growth. Last year, he played on ability. This year, he’s started to think along with it.”

Griffey Sr. is said to be weighing TV offers in Cincinnati and has given no indication whether he will play another year. The Mariners are hoping he does--both from his value as a role player and as a steadying and motivational influence on Junior.

With a minimum major league salary of $100,000 translating to about $581 a day, based on a 172-day season, there are fewer September call-ups, because of the cost factor.

However, Met pitcher Jeff Innis is a veteran of the process, having received a September call-up for the third time in his career. How is an SCU treated? Innis laid out the following:

--”They don’t use fabric softener when they wash your uniforms.”

--”You have to sit on each other’s laps on the bus.”

--”You double up on planes if it’s tight.”

--”If you talk, you’re arrogant. If you don’t, you’re an enigma.”

--”You can’t bound the spread.”

Translation: No postgame meal until the veterans have been fed.