Dodgers Suffer Another Ugly Loss

The Dodgers figure things can’t get worse for them, though their disturbing performance indicates otherwise.

The disappointing ballclub continued to regress Sunday afternoon as the Athletics completed a three-game interleague sweep with a 9-3 victory at Network Associates Coliseum.

Oakland broke the game open by scoring five runs in the fifth inning with only one ball being hit out of the infield. The Athletics chased frustrated starter Darren Dreifort while taking an 8-1 lead before a crowd of 27,973.

The Dodgers (29-32) have lost six of seven and are three games under .500 for the first time this season. They showed consistency, finishing the series with the typically perplexing play that marked their first two losses to Oakland (33-29).

There were mix-ups defensively and other bewildering decisions that left the Dodgers wondering about themselves. They were held in check by rookie right-hander Tim Hudson (1-0), who worked seven strong innings to earn his first victory in his second major league start.

The Dodgers, who had yet another team meeting before the game, acknowledge things are as bad as they appear. If not worse.

“I didn’t think it could get any worse [than before the Oakland series], and then this happens,” said shortstop Jose Vizcaino, who struck out looking to end the game. “I think everyone is just stunned by this.

“I’m not going to say we got swept by a bad team because they played better than we did. You have to give them their credit for that. But we shouldn’t be losing to the teams we’ve been losing to this year.

“We’re just playing bad, bad baseball. I don’t think anybody knows [what do to about it]. Something is going to have to change, but I don’t know. Something has to happen to get us playing right.”

They certainly didn’t move in the right direction Sunday.

“Obviously, we’re struggling right now, but no one is going to feel sorry for us,” said first baseman Eric Karros, who went three for four with a run batted in. “But regardless of what happened today or yesterday, we’ve got 100 [101] games left. We’re going to play those games regardless of whether we want to or not. So you get out of here and you focus on Tuesday’s game.”

Dreifort (5-5) continued to struggle with his command. The right-hander walked six and threw 92 pitches (46 strikes) in only 4 1/3 innings. Hudson had the same pitch total and threw 13 more strikes in seven innings.

It was the same story with the hard-throwing Dreifort. He gave up only four hits but couldn’t overcome the walks.

Manager Davey Johnson removed Dreifort after he walked pinch-hitter Tim Raines in the fifth with bases loaded, forcing in a run to give Oakland a 4-1 lead. Dreifort walked three straight batters and lost in his third straight decision. The Dodgers are 0-4 in his last four starts.

“The walks are killing him,” Johnson said of Dreifort, who leads the staff with 48 walks in 67 1/3 innings. “He gets in a pretty good groove, he gets pretty comfortable in his slot, and then he comes out of it.”

Oakland scored four more runs in the fifth against Jamie Arnold, who entered the game after Onan Masaoka relieved Dreifort and got the second out. Dreifort was charged with seven runs, increasing his earned-run average from 5.86 to 6.42.

However, Dreifort’s ERA is not the highest on the team. Starter Carlos Perez has a 7.18 ERA.

That’s how bad things are going for this bunch.

Not surprisingly, Dreifort wasn’t in a talkative mood, declining to speak with reporters. His pitching coach filled the void.

“He’s frustrated more than anything because he knows he’s better than that,” said pitching coach Claude Osteen. “You’ve got the plan in your mind, and you know what you want the ball to do, and it does something else.

“I think some of these guys [the Dodger starting pitchers] are at a stage where they are not far enough along as pitchers, where they know themselves well enough to know how to make corrections. And you put that together with the pressing part of it, when you’re trying to do too much, and that’s when you run into a lot of problems.”

To this point, the Dodgers have had nothing but problems.

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* 22 RUNS FOR ORIOLES: Cal Ripken’s six RBIs lead Baltimore past Atlanta, 22-1. Page 8