All Talk, No Answers After Dodger Loss

The Dodgers angrily resented the implication last season. They spent most of the time defending themselves. It was grossly unfair, they contended, to be labeled as underachievers.

This time, the worst criticism is coming from their mouths.

The Dodgers found themselves trying to explain another defeat Sunday afternoon, 4-2 to the Pittsburgh Pirates at Three Rivers Stadium.

They said a few weeks ago that it still was early. They started calling it one of those nagging hitting slumps. Today, they are out of answers.

All they know is they expected to contend with the Atlanta Braves for the National League pennant, and certainly win the National League West, but they are sitting in last place with a 15-17 record, 4 1/2 games behind the San Diego Padres.

When you spend $25 million to retain three of your free-agent pitchers, and $4.9 million more for shortstop Greg Gagne and third baseman Mike Blowers, there’s something dreadfully wrong when the Florida Marlins are the only National League team with more losses.

“We’re underachieving,” Dodger second baseman Delino DeShields said, “there’s no question about that. But the bottom line is execution. And it’s not my place to say what we’re not doing as a club.

“We’ve got to talk about this thing. The coaches can only do so much and talk to us so many times. We have to get ourselves together and make up our minds what we want to do.

“We keep talking about it being early in the season, but hey, it ain’t as early anymore.”

The most frustrating aspect of the Dodgers’ ordeal is that they’re wasting stellar pitching performances. They lead the major leagues with a 2.95 earned-run average, and on Sunday starter Ismael Valdes yielded only six hits and three runs in seven innings. Valdes, who left trailing, 3-2, after Charlie Hayes drove in the go-ahead run in the seventh, retired the first 13 batters.

Once again, it wasn’t enough.

The Dodgers have scored two or fewer runs in 12 games, they have scored fewer runs than every team in the major leagues except the Marlins, and they have the worst slugging percentage in baseball.

The Dodgers scored two unearned runs in the second inning on successive doubles by Mike Busch and Roger Cedeno, but managed only four hits past the infield the rest of the game. They struck out only twice, equaling their season low, but grounded into three double plays. The heart of the order--Mike Piazza, Eric Karros and Raul Mondesi--went hitless in 12 at-bats.

They had a chance to break the game open in the fifth inning when they had runners on second and third with one out, but Gagne grounded out to second and Piazza grounded out to shortstop. The Dodgers now have scored six earned runs in their last 36 innings, and are batting .258 with runners in scoring position.

“It’s just a stagnant offense right now,” Karros said. “The offense has been horrible. When you’re not hitting, you’ve got to make the most out of your opportunities, and we’re not doing that. And in scoring position, we’re horrifying.

“The middle of the order, we haven’t done a lick. Piazza is swinging the bat well, but Mondesi [.192] and myself [.224] have done zip. You can’t kid anybody. We’re expected to drive in runs, and we haven’t done that.”

Karros is batting .333 with runners in scoring position, compared to Mondesi’s .161, but only once in the last four games has Karros batted with a runner in scoring position.

“We’re lucky nobody in this division is running away with this thing,” Karros said. “At least we’re not 10 games out. If it wasn’t for our pitching, we’d be in serious trouble.

“But you can have the best pitching staff in the history of the game, and if you don’t score runs, you’ll be lucky to be a .500 team.”

Said Piazza: “We’re a little lethargic right now. I can’t put my finger on why, but it’s frustrating. We’re just not a very good ballclub right now.

“I don’t want to pass the buck or make excuses, but we’re just not playing the way we need to be playing.”