Hollandsworth: Catch of Year for Dodgers?

Surely, there has to be a mistake somewhere. This can’t be happening. Not in this generation.

Players such as Dodger rookie center fielder Todd Hollandsworth aren’t supposed to exist in this modern era of baseball. You’re supposed to be worried about your hair style for the TV cameras, lining up your next endorsement, and making sure your agent tells the world that you’re the next superstar.

Then along comes Hollandsworth, making you wonder if you just stepped back into the ‘50s with Willie, Mickey and the Duke.

Hollandsworth, who in only 10 days has been hailed as the savior of the Dodgers’ playoff hopes, came to the rescue once again Sunday by making the game-saving catch in the Dodgers’ 4-2 victory over the Florida Marlins.

It didn’t matter that Hollandsworth reached base only one time in the game, and promptly was picked off. The Dodgers, Marlins and the paid crowd of 27,418 at Joe Robbie Stadium spent the rest of the night talking about the catch.

“That saved the game, it’s as simple as that,” Dodger Manager Tom Lasorda said. “When he gets his feet on the ground, he’s going to be outstanding. He’s got that hidden quality about him. He just loves to play.”

He also couldn’t care less if the media ignores him. Hollandsworth, 22, is polite and gracious, but you get the feeling he’d rather be running sprints in 100-degree heat than entertaining a flock of sportswriters in an air-conditioned clubhouse.

“He’s a throwback,” Dodger third baseman Tim Wallach, 37, said. “He comes out, is ready to play, plays hard, and then gets ready to play the next day.

“I like that.

“How can you not?”

Hollandsworth, batting .361 with three homers, eight runs batted in and eight runs scored in the 10 games since moving into the starting lineup, saved his heroics for the seventh inning.

The Dodgers, whose only hit off Marlin starter Chris Hammond in the first six innings was courtesy of starter Tom Candiotti, finally took a 2-0 lead in the seventh on Roberto Kelly’s two-out, two-run homer.

“I wanted to do something to make up for what happened yesterday,” said Kelly, whose error permitted five unearned runs in Saturday’s 11-10 loss. “You can’t help but think about it. Nobody wants to be the one who makes the team lose ballgames.”

The trouble, Kelly feared, was that his homer would soon be for naught. Candiotti, already saved by Wallach’s diving stop of a potential double earlier in the inning, loaded the bases with one out in the seventh.

He then fell behind 2-and-1 to Charles Johnson, and cringed when Johnson hit the ball toward the left-center gap. If he was lucky, Candiotti thought, it would score two runs. But he figured it was a three-run double.

“I was just begging the whole way,” said Candiotti (5-8).

Said Kelly: “I thought for sure it was dropping in. I didn’t think he [Hollandsworth] had a chance.”

Yet, out of nowhere, came Hollandsworth. Running as fast and far as he could, and still believing it wasn’t good enough, he dove for the ball . . . and caught it.

“It was unbelievable,” Kelly said. “What an absolutely great play.”

Hollandsworth shrugged. “I thought I had a chance for it,” he said. “I looked up, knew it wasn’t going to hit the wall, so I went after it.”

Instead of a three-run double, the Marlins were left with a mere sacrifice fly. They never did recover. The Dodgers (40-40), aided by Mike Piazza’s pinch-hit homer in the eighth, closed out the game when Todd Worrell pitched the final 1 2/3 innings for his 16th save.

The Dodgers have found a hero and, as they’ll tell you themselves, it couldn’t come at a better time.

“I’d heard a lot about him, but I never had really seen him play,” said first baseman Eric Karros, who also saved a potential double and picked up two errant throws by shortstop Jose Offerman. “Obviously, he’s just as advertised. That attitude he’s got is just what we need.”

After supplanting Billy Ashley, Hollandsworth has brought new life to the team.

“It’s been a blast,” he said.

“Actually, it’s been a dream.”