Streak Is Only a Memory : Dodgers: Hershiser is rocked by Reds, who collect 19 hits in 8-4 victory. L.A. falls 9 1/2 games behind Giants.

For as well as the Dodgers have played, they are about in the same place as when their victory parade started.

Actually worse.

After Saturday’s 8-4 loss to the Cincinnati Reds, the Dodgers are 9 1/2 games out of first place in the National League West.

The Dodgers were nine games back on May 17, the day their 11-game winning streak began.

They may have moved up from fifth to third place and have a 34-31 record instead of 14-22, but they have made up no ground on the San Francisco Giants, who remain in first place.

“As well as we have played, it’s tough, but there is a consolation: Just think where we would have been if we hadn’t gone on a hot streak?” said Orel Hershiser, who got shelled by the Reds for 12 hits and seven runs in 4 1/3 innings.

“We would have been buried.”

The Dodgers turned their team around after a 5-4 comeback victory against the Reds, but they have yet to turn their season around. Since then, they have a 20-9 record, but the Giants have gone 21-9.

“We can’t gain a game, it’s tough,” Manager Tom Lasorda said. “But they will go into a losing streak and lose four or five and we will win four or five. They are playing .625 baseball (actually .662 at 45-23). They won’t do that forever. We have to wait for them to go into a tailspin and make our move.”

The Reds are hoping that their two consecutive victories against the Dodgers will put them on the move. On May 17 the Reds were 19-18, they had a seven-game winning streak and were 4 1/2 games out of first. Then they lost six of seven, posted a 13-18 record and plummeted to fifth place, 13 games back.

The Reds’ victory ensures that the Dodgers will lose a series for the first time since mid-May, after seven victories and one split.

“There’s a little frustration after Colorado and those two games in San Diego because we should beat the last three-place teams, but we have to win the games with the teams ahead of us now,” Brett Butler said.

“But like Eric (Karros) said, we play nine more games against San Francisco, so we’ve got to prevail.”

To do so, they need to stay away from games like Saturday’s, when the Reds had 19 hits, their season high and the most against the Dodgers since May 19, 1990.

Hershiser (6-5) was shaky from the start, giving up four consecutive singles in the first inning, two home runs and a double in the second inning and two more singles in the third.

“Three of the first four hits found holes and then after that, the real hits began,” Hershiser said.

“I had all my pitches tonight, couldn’t you tell? I tried them all anyway.”

By the fourth inning, the Reds led, 5-3, with Dodger runs coming on Mike Piazza’s 13th home run in the second inning and a two-run double by Eric Davis in the third, scoring Hershiser and Jose Offerman, who had singled.

The Reds knocked out Hershiser in the fifth when they scored two runs on three hits and a throwing error by Davis. After Bobby Kelly’s blooper fell in for a single, Davis’ throw to home plate bounced off the mound and over Piazza’s head, scoring Hal Morris and putting Kelly at second.

Reggie Sanders’ single scored Kelly to put the Reds up, 7-3, and Hershiser was relieved by Rick Trlicek, who gave up the Reds’ eighth run in the sixth.

One of the Reds’ home runs was a two-run shot by starting pitcher Tom Browning (4-3), who gave up all four runs in six innings. Bobby Ayala gave up one hit in the last three innings to earn his third save.

“We have to do decent work to catch up, but we can,” Hershiser said. “Any time you are 16 or 17 games out at the All-Star break there’s little chance, but any time you are under 10 games, you can catch a hot streak again.”

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