Martinez Runs Out of Runs : Dodgers: Pitcher doesn’t get his usual support and rally comes up short against the Cardinals, 5-4.

Ramon Martinez, who is used to a surplus of runs when he pitches, didn’t get quite enough Saturday night as the Dodgers lost to the St. Louis Cardinals, 5-4.

The Dodgers average 6.5 runs in Martinez’s starts, but they were below average for most of the game Saturday. Martinez, who was bidding to become the National League’s first 11-game winner and had never lost to the Cardinals, opened the game by striking out the first three batters.

But he left after seven innings on the short end of a 4-1 score and took the loss to fall to 10-3, a victim of rare lack of support--the Dodgers left nine men on base and left the bases loaded twice--and some timely Cardinal hitting.

“I feel good, I had good stuff today,” Martinez said. “I tried to keep ‘em close, we have some opportunities to get some runs and didn’t score.”

In fact, Martinez knocked in the only Dodger run with a fifth-inning ground-out before the Dodgers finally roused the home crowd of 46,101 with an eighth-inning rally.

Trailing 5-1, the Dodgers jumped on three St. Louis relievers in the eighth, sending nine men to the plate and pulling to within a run. But Lee Smith, on the way to his 15th save, left the bases loaded after Eddie Murray had singled in two runs and Kal Daniels another to cut the lead to 5-4. Smith then stranded Brett Butler on second in the ninth to save the game for Bryn Smith (5-4).

Dodger Manager Tom Lasorda said: “Bases loaded, one out (in the eighth)--to me that was the whole ballgame.”

In the eighth, Butler and Juan Samuel singled and Darryl Strawberry walked to load the bases. Lee Smith came on and gave up Murray’s two-run single and Daniels’ run-scoring hit. Lenny Harris sacrificed, Mike Scioscia was walked intentionally and the bases were loaded with one out and the Dodgers down by a run.

Stan Javier, however, struck out as a pinch-hitter for Alfredo Griffin and Gary Carter flied out to end the threat.

Martinez said that when his grounder tied the score, 1-1, in the fifth: “I was thinking, ‘Just get me one more run.’ ”

With Atlanta losing earlier, the Dodgers maintained their three-game lead in the Western Division. St. Louis pulled to within five games of Pittsburgh in the East.

Martinez worked four perfect innings out of the first five but ran into trouble in the second, when he gave up four hits and a walk and got away cheaply with a 1-0 deficit. After Tom Pagnozzi singled in Felix Jose, Todd Zeile was caught in a rundown on a failed suicide squeeze and Martinez left the bases loaded.

The Dodgers tied the game in the fifth with their own fizzled rally, as the first three batters singled to load the bases and Martinez’s lightly hit grounder to short scored a run. But Samuel lined out to second and Strawberry took strike three to leave the bases loaded.

After retiring nine in a row, Martinez had another rough inning and the Cardinals took a 3-1 lead in the sixth on three consecutive singles, the last a run-scoring grounder to left by Pedro Guerrero. Milt Thompson then scored as Jose grounded into a double play.

The Cardinals had eight hits off Martinez, six coming in the second and sixth innings.

St. Louis scored again in the seventh on a two-out walk to pinch-hitter Rex Hudler, who stole second and continued to third when Scioscia’s throw went into the outfield for an error. Ray Lankford followed with an infield single off Samuel’s glove for a 4-1 lead.

The Cardinals padded the lead to 5-1 in the eighth against Mike Hartley when Thompson led off with a double, stole third and scored what proved to be the decisive run on Hartley’s wild pitch.