Dodgers Hit, but Fall Short : Baseball: They leave 17 runners on base and lose to Pirates in 12th, 2-1.

After the Pittsburgh Pirates scored a run to lead the Dodgers, 2-1, Wednesday night, those who remained from the original crowd of 33,914, started their own extra-inning tradition:

The 12th-inning whistle.

With Jim Gott (4-7) pitching after Al Martin doubled and scored on a single by Andy Tomberlin, the crowd started to sound like a bunch of birds. They whistled and yelled until the Pirates’ Denny Neagle (3-5) shut the Dodgers down and stopped their winning streak at six games.

After scoring at least six runs in seven victories against the Pirates, the Dodgers couldn’t buy a run in this one.

When Dodger starter Tom Candiotti left the game against after eight innings for a pinch-hitter, his earned-run average of 2.43 was still the lowest in the National League. But his team was trailing, 1-0, and the Dodgers were still looking for a run.

Through seven innings, they had stranded 12 runners, and by the end of the game they had left 17 on.

But in the eighth, Jose Offerman hit a sacrifice fly to center field to tie the score, 1-1, send Candiotti away with a no-decision and eventually put the game into extra innings. He also received a standing ovation from the crowd.

Pitching on the wrong end of a one-run game is becoming an unwanted routine for Candiotti, who is 5-0 with 10 no-decisions in his last 15 starts. The Dodgers have scored two runs or fewer in 11 of his 26 starts. They usually wait until he leaves the game to win, but the team usually wins.

After the Dodgers failed to score in the seventh inning, leaving the bases loaded, Candiotti got up off the Dodger bench, picked up his glove, put on his cap and walked deliberately back to the mound. He retired the next three batters in order to make it 12 in a row. When he eventually left the game for pinch-hitter Dave Hansen, Candiotti had given up one run, four hits, one walk and struck out seven batters.

Offerman had tried to get Candiotti a run, but until his sacrifice fly in the eighth inning to tie the score, he had been left in scoring position four times--three times on third base.

Offerman is batting .550 (11 for 20) in his last five games, with six runs scored, including a double, triple and three runs batted in. His overall batting average of .282 is the highest by a shortstop since Bill Russell batted .260 in 1985, a mark Offerman equaled last season.

“It is nothing that surprises me, it’s just that everything is going real well right now,” Offerman said. “I know (for a shortstop) nobody expects it, but I’m trying to be a good hitter and want to continue being one.”

Offerman’s 54 runs batted in are also the most by an L.A. Dodger shortstop since Russell drove in 56 in 1979. But Offerman, who bats second, had a difficult time adding to that RBI figure on Wednesday.

Leadoff hitter Brett Butler has been in a slump, with only nine hits in 61 at bats before coming to bat in the seventh inning. Butler, who is growing a mustache as a means of support until Hansen breaks the Dodger pinch-hit record, said the mustache is also serving as a way for him to hide because of the slump.

“Butler always has a motive for everything,” Hansen said.

Butler led off the seventh with a single to left and stole second before Pirate starter Paul Wagner walked Offerman, Wagner’s fifth walk of the game.

After Mike Piazza popped out, Wagner was relieved by Mark Dewey, who walked Cory Snyder to load the bases. But Eric Karros’ check swing bounced Dewey’s pitch into the infield and Butler was forced at home. Eric Davis ended the Dodgers’ threat by flying out to deep center.

After giving up a run in the first inning, Candiotti retired 21 of the next 24 batters he faced. But that one run haunted the Dodgers throughout the entire game.

In the third inning with one out, Offerman drove a liner over the second-base bag and went to third on an opposite-field single to right by Piazza.

But Snyder popped out and Karros was called out when it was ruled he went around on the third strike.