McGriff Puts Smiles Back On S.D. Faces : Baseball: He breaks out of a slump with two hits and three RBIs to lead the Padres past the St. Louis Cardinals, 4-3.

Fred McGriff never sulked. He never moaned about his toe. And never, ever, did he show his temper.

The way McGriff was acting, you didn’t know if he was on the verge of making Roger Maris’ home run record obsolete, or making the Mendoza line look like an unconquerable barrier.

On Saturday night, after the Padres’ 4-3 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals at Busch Stadium, if you looked closely, McGriff actually showed the hint of a smile.

“Deep down inside, I feel good, real good,” McGriff said. “But you know me, I’m not one to show my emotions.”

McGriff’s outing isn’t going to appear on anyone’s highlight film. There wasn’t even a homer included in his two-for-four, three RBI performance.

But when you’ve been buried in the kind of slump in which McGriff was wallowing the past month, a game like this one makes a guy feel like everything’s all right again.

“I needed that one,” McGriff said, breaking into a slow, expansive grin. “I know myself pretty well, and when I’m bad, I’m bad. And I was bad.”

Just how bad?

He had gone 30 days without a multiple-hit game.

He was batting .157 since May 22.

He had gone 20 at-bats without a hit.

And during his slump, the Padres were sliding deeper and deeper out of contention.

“When he’s not hitting for us,” said Merv Rettenmund, Padre batting coach, “we need four hits in a row for us to score. We don’t have too many guys who can go deep.”

McGriff didn’t hit a home run on this night, either, but without him, the Padres would have been looking at another defeat.

It was the first time this season that McGriff has had more than two RBIs in a game without the aid of a home run. But did he ever come through when the Padres needed him to do so.

The Padres were scoreless in the fourth inning, and had only two hits off Cardinal starter Ken Hill, when McGriff stepped to the plate with one out and Tony Fernandez on third.

It appeared that Hill was going to walk him, throwing three consecutive balls, but then he came back with a fastball over the plate on a 3-and-0 pitch, and McGriff fouled it off.

The next pitch--a slider--also was over the plate, and McGriff swung again. This time, he hit the ball up the middle for a single, scoring Fernandez. It was his first hit since June 13, when the Cardinals last were in San Diego, and his first RBI since last facing Hill on June 12, when he hit a three-run homer.

“I finally felt good up there, like I knew what I was doing,” McGriff said. “It hasn’t been the pitchers that have been getting me out, it’s been myself.”

The Padres, though, needed his help one more time.

Padre starter Jose Melendez, after breezing through the first three innings facing the minimum nine batters, found himself dazed in the fourth. Melendez gave up five consecutive hits, resulting in three runs, and was a batter away from leaving the game.

It looked like the game might stay that way, with the Cardinals clinging to a 3-1 lead, when McGriff again came to the rescue in the sixth.

Bip Roberts led off the with a walk. Tony Fernandez followed with a single. And Gwynn came back with another, scoring Roberts and advancing Fernandez to third. That was all Cardinal Manager Joe Torre needed to see. He brought in left-handed reliever Juan Agosto to face McGriff.

Agosto immediately got ahead on an 0-2 count, but after throwing a pitch in the dirt, he came back with one in the strike zone. It was a slider, just like he wanted to throw. But instead of being low and away, it was up over the plate.

“I knew I was in trouble,” Agosto said.

McGriff lined it into left-center for a double, scoring Fernandez and Gwynn for a 4-3 Padre lead.

Game, set and match.

“I think he’s back now,” said Rettenmund. “It all started with that (bruised) toe. That messed up his mechanics. But he never said a darn word. Every time you ask him how it is, he’d say, ‘It’s OK. It’s OK.’ ”

Said Padre Manager Greg Riddoch: “He has the kind of demeanor if he was 15-for-15, or zero-for-15, you’d never know it.”

Considering that McGriff never snapped any bats over his knee, destroyed any toilets, or smashed his locker, you can imagine his reaction to his heroics.

“Hey, just another day on the job, right?” McGriff said.

Actually, the one showing the most emotion in the Padre clubhouse was Melendez, 3-2, who has turned out to be perhaps the team’s biggest surprise. Here’s a guy who was dumped by the Seattle Mariners during spring training, claimed by the Padres for $20,000, went 7-0 at triple-A Las Vegas, and now has emerged as a lifesaver in the Padre rotation.

Melendez, who allowed eight hits and three earned runs in 6 1/3 innings, not only has been a nice fill-in during the Padres’ injury woes, but appears to be a fixture in the rotation.

“I’ve shown I can pitch,” said Melendez, who was recommended to the Padres by triple-A Manager Jim Riggleman and Tom Gamboa, minor-league coordinator. “I don’t think the Mariners thought anyone would take me. And that surprised me. I wonder what they think now?”

After Melendez left the game with a runner on first in the seventh, Rich Rodriguez and Craig Lefferts shut down the Cardinals the rest of the way. The only tense moment came in the ninth when Todd Zeile was on second base with one out. But Lefferts induced Craig Wilson into a groundout, and Rex Hudler bounced out to second baseman Tim Teufel, giving Lefferts his 14th save.

And what’s a Padre victory without Gwynn?

Even though he entered the game batting .182 against Hill, Gwynn added him to his list of victims, going two for four and raising his batting average to .371.

Instead of celebrating, Gwynn was a bit miffed, albeit good-naturedly.

Riddoch wants to rest Gwynn and his aching shin splints, and sit him out for today’s game. Sorry, Gwynn says, but he wants to play in all 162 games this season. Although he appreciates everyone’s concern, he despises sitting on the bench.

“They say they don’t like me limping around out there,” Gwynn said, “but that didn’t stop them from giving me a steal sign, did it? I’m going to play. I don’t want a day off. And unless they force me to sit out, I’ll be playing today.”

Said McGriff: “I hope Tony plays myself. I love watching him out there. Everybody has peaks and valleys, but Tony, I haven’t seen his valley yet.

“Man, that must be a nice feeling.”