Dodgers Erase 7-0 Deficit Only to Lose in Ninth

Talk about a switch. On Friday night, the Dodgers let Darryl Strawberry down.

In his most impressive game of the season, Strawberry led his teammates on a comeback from a 7-0 deficit to the Houston Astros. He homered, doubled, singled and scored the tying run while the Dodgers took an 8-7 lead with three outs remaining.

But with Strawberry watching helplessly from right field, the Dodger bullpen could get only one of those outs.

Jay Howell walked two before pinch-hitter Rafael Ramirez drove them in with a double against John Candelaria to give the last-place Astros a 9-8 victory before 26,079.

In a somber clubhouse afterward, none of the Dodgers dared smile. But few were frowning as much as Strawberry, who is hitting .354 in his last 18 games with six home runs in his last 52 at-bats.

“After the kind of night we had, when you go out to the field in the ninth, you most definitely have to feel that the game is over with,” Strawberry said.

“You’ve been fighting back all night, you’ve finally got the lead . . . You have to think that it’s done.”

He paused. “It’s tough when something like this happens. It’s tough when we don’t get the job done.”

The second-place Atlanta Braves also lost, so the Dodgers remained 4 1/2 games ahead. But they say this business of treading water is getting old.

After gaining two games in the last two days before the All-Star break, the Dodgers have lost a half-game in the 23 days since.

“This is the time of year when you can’t afford to give away any games,” Strawberry said.

“I know we didn’t lose any ground, but we didn’t gain any, either. Anything we can do to increase our lead, we have to take advantage of it.

“This is not April or May anymore. We all have to start giving a little bit more.”

This latest loss was unusual not only because of the way the Dodgers came back, but because of how they quickly fell apart.

Howell, who had walked three batters unintentionally in 35 2/3 innings before Friday, walked two of the three batters he faced. After retiring Casey Candaele on a grounder, he walked Luis Gonzalez on a full count. He walked Craig Biggio on a full count after Biggio fouled off five pitches.

“I try to throw the ball across the plate and let them hit it--it really bothers me to walk anybody,” Howell said, shaking his head.

“I thought some of those pitches were around the plate. I don’t like losing no matter how we get the lead. It stinks.”

While the Astros mobbed each other at home plate after Biggio scored the winning run, celebrating their season-high fifth consecutive victory, the Dodgers trudged through a long dugout. In that spot only a few minutes earlier, they had been celebrating.

They scored the tying and winning runs in the ninth on Strawberry’s leadoff double to left, pinch-hitter Chris Gwynn’s single to right, and, a bunt later, Alfredo Griffin’s single to right.

Strawberry’s run was particularly dramatic because he contorted his body while running past catcher Craig Biggio, who barely missed a swipe tag.

“You can tell, he is starting to feel comfortable,” Gwynn said of Strawberry.

“He’s got this whip in his bat again.”

That whip was particularly evident when Strawberry began the comeback in the fourth inning with a home run to left field against starter Jimmy Jones.

After the Dodgers scored three runs in the fifth on Juan Samuel’s two-run triple and Eddie Murray’s grounder, Strawberry drove in another run with a two-out single in the seventh.

“Finally, I’m hitting the ball where they are pitching it,” Strawberry said.

“I finally feel settled in. It’s like, OK, I’m in Los Angeles for real now. It’s time to get down to business.”

The Astros had taken their 7-0 lead in the second and third innings against starter Bob Ojeda and reliever Jim Gott.

Ojeda has not made it past the third inning in two of this last three starts, giving up five runs--four earned--in two innings. Gott gave up two runs in two innings.

In the second inning, rookie shortstop Andujar Cedeno, who had four runs batted in in his 13th major league game, and Steve Finley each singled in two runs. The fifth run scored when Samuel botched a rundown attempt between first and second involving Finley, Biggio scoring from third.

In the third, Cedeno hit his fist major league home run, a two-run shot that gave him six RBIs in six games.

Candelaria, who had given up only six hits in 35 at-bats by the first batter to face him, gave up the hit to Ramirez on two pitches. It was Ramirez’s 15th and 16th RBIs of the season.

Said Candelaria: “I threw two pitches, both strikes. Obviously, he liked one of them.”