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BASEBALL / DAILY REPORT : DODGERS : Howell Shows He’s Nearly Ready

By BILL PLASCHKE
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Kip Gross lowered his spring earned-run average to 2.08 Saturday, but it may not help his chances of making the team because, on the same field, Jay Howell was raising expectations.

Shortly before Gross worked out of a bases-loaded, none-out jam to set up the Dodgers’ 7-4 victory over the Atlanta Braves, Howell threw well enough to make the Dodgers say he could be ready in the first few days of this season.

Instead of putting Howell on the disabled list Saturday, the first day they could have made that move, they have decided to wait.

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“There is some daylight there. We think Jay could be ready to pitch opening day,” said Fred Claire, vice president, after Howell threw for 15 minutes off a mound.

If Howell starts the season with the team, Gross is the leading candidate to be sent to triple-A Albuquerque.

The Dodgers scored six runs in the eighth inning to defeat the Braves, but the Braves made their point in the first six innings when Tom Glavine gave up two hits and struck out nine. . . . Raul Mondesi’s three-run homer and Mike Piazza’s two-run single highlighted the comeback.
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Bill Plaschke

Bill Plaschke, an L.A. Times sports columnist since 1996, is a member of the National Sports Media Hall of Fame and California Sports Hall of Fame. He has been named national Sports Columnist of the Year nine times by the Associated Press, and twice by the Society of Professional Journalists and National Headliner Awards. He is the author of six books, including a collection of his columns entitled “Plaschke: Good Sports, Spoilsports, Foul Balls and Oddballs.” Plaschke is also a panelist on the popular ESPN daily talk show, “Around the Horn.” He is in the national Big Brothers/Big Sisters Alumni Hall of Fame and has been named Man of the Year by the Los Angeles Big Brothers/Big Sisters as well as receiving a Pursuit of Justice Award from the California Women’s Law Center. Plaschke has appeared in a movie (“Ali”), a dramatic HBO series (“Luck”) and, in a crowning cultural moment he still does not quite understand, his name can be found in a rap song “Females Welcome” by Asher Roth.

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