NATIONAL LEAGUE ROUNDUP : Cardinal Pitcher Hits Marlin, Brawl Follows

In a wild second-inning brawl between the Florida Marlins and St. Louis Cardinals Sunday at Miami, even umpire Charlie Relford was hit.

The Cardinals scored four runs in the top of the ninth, including two on a double by Gregg Jefferies, to win the game, 10-9.

The brawl started after Jeff Conine hit Florida’s third homer of the inning off Allen Watson and the Cardinal pitcher hit the next batter, Orestes Destrade, on the left shoulder with a pitch.

Destrade, who had a two-run double in the first inning, charged the mound. Watson threw his glove at Destrade’s face, opening a cut on the bridge of his nose. Destrade then landed a solid punch to Watson’s face and the benches emptied.

In the ensuing melee, Cardinal left fielder Bernard Gilkey and Marlin reliever Luis Aquino tangled, with Gilkey accidentally landing a punch on the back of Relford’s head.

Destrade and Aquino of the Marlins and Watson and Gilkey of the Cardinals were ejected.

“You got a kid out of college trying to play like he’s in the big leagues,” Destrade said of Watson. “Basically, he’s a little wimpy college boy.”

Watson, who was an All-American at New York Institute of Technology in 1991, said: “I threw inside trying to get him off the plate but it ran too much. I knew he was going to charge and I wasn’t going to stand there and get my head kicked in.”

San Diego 7, Houston 6--The Padres’ club-record 13-game losing steak is over. Phil Plantier hit a two-run homer in the eighth inning at Houston to give San Diego a victory.

Craig Shipley led off the eighth inning with a single and, two outs later, Plantier homered to right off Mitch Williams (1-4).

Luis Gonzalez hit a two-out, two-run double off reliever Pedro Martinez (1-1) in the seventh inning to give the Astros a 6-5 lead.

Chicago 6, San Francisco 5--Derrick May hit a leadoff homer in the 11th inning at Chicago to give the Cubs their sixth consecutive victory.

Cub starter Anthony Young gave up six hits in seven innings and left with a 5-4 lead.

Atlanta 8, Colorado 3--Greg Maddux struck out nine batters in seven innings at Denver as the Braves extended their two-year record against the Rockies to 16-0.

The Braves swept the three-game series and handed the Rockies their fifth consecutive loss.

Montreal 3, Pittsburgh 2--Expo pitcher Pedro Martinez got his first major league hit in 23 at-bats, tripling in the fourth inning to knock in three runs at Pittsburgh.

Pirate starter Denny Neagle also got his first big-league hit, a fifth-inning single to snap an 0-for-40 streak.

Martinez’s triple, a medium-range fly to right-center, fell between a sliding Andy Van Slyke and right fielder Dave Clark, who were playing unusually shallow.

Expo Manager Felipe Alou said, “They were playing him shallow because he was 0 for lifetime. . . . Was I surprised he hit it that far? I was surprised he hit it.”

Martinez (3-3) gave up homers by Van Slyke and Tom Foley. He knocked down the batters that followed them, Jeff King and Don Slaught, but there were no incidents.

Philadelphia 8, New York 3--Lenny Dykstra, Pete Incaviglia and Darren Daulton each led off innings with home runs as the Phillies routed the Mets at Philadelphia to sweep a three-game series.