Maddux Out but Braves Aren’t

How do you replace a Cy Young Award winner?

With a pitcher with an even better record, if you’re the Braves, who found Greg Maddux (9-6) unable to pitch against the Florida Marlins on Friday night and sent out Tom Glavine.

He got help in the form of a two-run homer by Chipper Jones in the seventh inning to lift the Braves to a 6-3 victory at Atlanta.

Glavine (10-5) gave up seven hits in seven innings in place of Maddux, who has an injured toe, suffered when he fouled a ball off his foot in a July 7 game against Houston. He is scheduled to try to pitch Monday’s game against Montreal.

That will start a 17-game, 19-day trip for the Braves, who are leaving the Olympics to Atlanta.

“It really feels good [to win Friday night],” said Jones, whose homer was No. 18 and accounted for RBIs Nos. 67 and 68. “We beat an all-star pitcher [Al Leiter] after trailing, 3-1. We gained a game on the Expos and we need all the cushion we can get with that 17-game road trip coming up.”

The cushion is six games.

Jeff Blauser and Mike Mordecai walked to start the Atlanta seventh inning. Blauser eventually scored on Mark Lemke’s sacrifice fly and Marquis Grissom reached on a fielder’s choice in front of Jones’ homer, a towering 362-footer to left field.

“I thought I got under it too much,” Jones said. “I usually drive them out, but that was a high one. I saw Jeff Conine give up on it at the fence, then I knew it was out. It was not one of my longer ones but it wasn’t a wall scraper, either.”

St. Louis 13, Chicago 3--Gary Gaetti and Ron Gant each hit two of the Cardinals’ seven home runs in Chicago, and they won for the eighth time in their last 11 games.

Brian Jordan, John Mabry and Ray Lankford also homered for St. Louis, which beat Steve Trachsel (7-6). The seven homers tied a Cardinal record set on May 7, 1940, against the Brooklyn Dodgers.

Andy Benes (7-8), who lost seven consecutive starts in April and May, won his fourth in a row and got plenty of help. Mabry went four for five for St. Louis, which had 18 hits, including at least one by every starter.

Philadelphia 5, Montreal 3--Terry Mulholland (7-6) improved to 12-2 lifetime against the Expos, beating them again in Montreal and sending the Phillies to their fifth win in six games.

He is 3-0 against the Expos this season and gave up nine hits in pitching his second complete game of the year, both against Montreal.

Pedro Martinez (7-4) gave up five runs in four innings in his shortest outing of the season.

Houston 3, New York 1--Shane Reynolds (11-5) beat the Mets for the third time this season and Derrick May singled in two runs in the first inning to make it easier at New York.

Houston ended a three-game losing streak and remained percentage points behind first-place St. Louis in the NL Central.

Reynolds scattered seven hits and struck out five in eight-plus innings and holds a 1.93 earned-run average in 23 1/3 innings against the Mets.

Cincinnati 5, Pittsburgh 2--Pitching for the first time in eight days, Mark Portugal (6-5) won his fifth consecutive start, this time with the help of solo homers by Eddie Taubensee and Reggie Sanders at Cincinnati.

He gave up six hits and struck out four over eight innings.

Pittsburgh’s Danny Darwin (7-9) gave up three runs in the first inning, one of them on Taubensee’s homer, and pitched from behind the rest of the night. He gave up only three hits in his next six innings.