BASEBALL PLAYOFFS : Braves Grab Homer-Field Advantage : National League: McGriff sparks 14-3 victory with upper-deck blast in first inning. Atlanta evens series.

Tommy Greene, former Atlanta Brave and roommate of David Justice and hard-throwing country boy whose nickname is Jethro, did not have his powerful fastball or curveball or much of anything when he took the mound to start Game 2 of the National League playoffs.

Even if he had, Justice said there wasn’t anything Greene could throw that he hadn’t seen before. And apparently the rest of the Braves have been watching, too.

Home runs by Fred McGriff, Jeff Blauser, Damon Berryhill and Terry Pendleton were more than enough to give the Braves a 14-3 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies at Veterans Stadium on Thursday night, evening the series at 1-1 and sending it to Atlanta for the next three games.

“I think we knew we had to win tonight, but I tried not to put any pressure on myself,” said Greg Maddux, who earned his first postseason victory by holding the Phillies to two runs and five hits through seven innings. He struck out eight.

It was the most home runs the Braves have hit during a postseason game. It was also the most runs scored by a team in any league championship series game. Their 16 hits tied a National League series record.

But it was the series record they set with their six consecutive hits in the third inning that mattered. When that inning was over, the Braves had hit three home runs in the game, had a six-run third inning to lead 8-0 and had sent a despondent Greene to the showers.

“I was up, up, up with everything, and they took advantage of if,” Greene said.

“This one was decided when Crime Dog (McGriff) killed a family of four,” the Phillies’ John Kruk said of a monstrous two-run home run by McGriff in the first inning.

McGriff, 0 for 7 lifetime against Greene, blasted the first pitch he saw from Greene into the upper deck in right field to give the Braves a 2-0 lead. It was only the seventh upper-deck homer in 22 years at the stadium.

“Has it come down yet?” Darren Daulton asked. “I was wondering if they gave that guy an error that tried to catch it.”

The home run was measured at 438 feet, but no one believed it.

“You always get cheated on the road,” McGriff said.

The homer, McGriff’s first in the postseason, seemed to ease the pressure on his team, but that’s something he has been doing since he arrived on July 20 with the Braves nine games behind the San Francisco Giants. After he arrived, the Braves went 51-17.

“I think it definitely helped, no one wanted to go home 0-2,” McGriff said. “I think everyone may have relaxed after that.”

Maddux, meanwhile, after pitching behind the hitters in the first inning, retired the next six batters before giving up a two-run homer to Dave Hollins in the fourth inning. The Phillies were held to three more hits until the ninth inning, when Lenny Dykstra homered off reliever Mark Wohlers. The six homers in the game set another series record.

“I said this before the game, the guy is the best pitcher in baseball,” Daulton said. “He throws everything but the kitchen sink, he has good movement and he doesn’t make mistakes. He keeps the ball down.”

For Maddux, this was a chance to avenge his poor performance in the 1989 NL playoffs when he was with the Chicago Cubs, although he says he erased that memory on the plane flight home. Maddux, then 22, lasted only four innings in Game 1 and 3 1/3 in Game 4 against the Giants. His earned-run average was 13.50.

This season, Maddux won 13 of his last 15 decisions to give him 20 victories for the second consecutive season and a league-leading 2.36 earned-run average. At 27, he has won 107 games in his last six seasons, more than anyone in baseball. He won the Cy Young Award last year and will probably win it again this year.

“Having a 5-0 lead against the Phillies is like having a two- or three-run lead against another team,” Maddux said. “But going from five runs up to eight was big.”

With one out in the third, Blauser homered. Ron Gant followed with a double, McGriff singled and Justice walked--after Greene had him 0-and-2. Terry Pendleton, who was three for five, hit a two-run single to put the Braves up, 5-0. Greene was relieved by Bobby Thigpen, the first of five relievers, who gave up a three-run homer to Berryhill.

It was more than enough to silence a sellout crowd of 62,436 at Veterans Stadium, who were counting on Greene, who had won 13 consecutive games at home.

Manager Jim Fregosi had designed the pitching rotation so Greene could pitch Game 6 at home if the series goes that long.

Greene had beaten the Braves here, 3-0, on Sept. 24, giving up three hits in 8 1/3 innings.

Nobody seems to know why Greene had pitched so well at home, but the question probably won’t be asked much anymore.

* BASEBALL REPORT: The memories--both good and bad--from Game 1 linger for Philadelphia’s Kim Batiste. C8

* JOHNNY BENCH: The Hall of Fame catcher and the Home Shopping Network are charged with duping collectibles consumers. C8