Galarraga Picks Up Where He Left Off

With one swing of his bat, Andres Galarraga did it again.

Galarraga hit a grand slam in the fifth inning to rally the Atlanta Braves to a 7-5 victory Saturday night over the San Francisco Giants at Atlanta.

“It’s an amazing story,” Atlanta Manager Bobby Cox said of his slugger, who missed the 1999 season because of cancer.

The Braves have won three games in the first week of the season and Galarraga has put them ahead to stay in each with home runs.

“He’s in midseason form,” Cox said. “He’s been like that since the start of spring training. He came back like he’s never been sick.”

The Atlanta first baseman hit a 425-foot drive over the center-field fence against the wind on the first pitch from Livan Hernandez, giving him three homers and nine runs batted in.

“I’m feeling comfortable at the plate,” said Galarraga, who said the homer was one of the hardest balls he ever hit. “I really crushed it. I had to because of that wind, but I knew it was out when I hit it.”

Greg Maddux gave up four runs and eight hits in seven innings for the win on a chilly Atlanta night. It was 42 degrees at game time with a wind chill in the low 30s.

Maddux also contributed to the winning rally, hitting a triple to right with one out in the fifth and the Braves trailing, 3-2. With two out, Reggie Sanders and Chipper Jones drew walks, loading the bases for Galarraga.

“He [Hernandez] threw him a breaking ball up,” Giant Manager Dusty Baker said. “Galarraga doesn’t miss them. We made a mistake to him and he lost it.”

Houston 8, Philadelphia 5--Moises Alou hit a two-run single in the fifth inning and a solo homer in the seventh for his first RBIs since the 1998 season, leading the Astros at Houston.

Alou, who missed all of last season recovering from knee surgery, put the Astros ahead to stay, 6-4, with his single against Kirk Bullinger.

Ken Caminiti hit a two-run homer against Chris Brock in the third inning to put Houston ahead, 4-2, and added a sacrifice fly in the seventh.

Arizona 6, Pittsburgh 5--Bernard Gilkey’s bases-loaded single with two out in the ninth gave the Diamondbacks the victory at Phoenix.

It was the second time in three days that Arizona won in its last at-bat, something the Diamondbacks did 24 times in winning the NL West title last year.

Luis Gonzalez and Jay Bell both hit their second home runs for Arizona.

Montreal 10, San Diego 9--Pinch-hitter Geoff Blum’s two-run double in the eighth inning rallied the Expos at Montreal.

The Expos trailed, 8-7, after Bret Boone’s solo homer against Anthony Telford in the top of the eighth.

Tony Gwynn returned to the lineup after missing the Padres’ last three games because of a sore right elbow. He hit a run-scoring double in the first and added a single for his 3,069th career hit.

St. Louis 10, Milwaukee 8--Mark McGwire hit his first home run and Fernando Tatis went three for four with four RBIs at St. Louis.

McGwire’s homer against Jim Bruske leading off the sixth went an estimated 424 feet and gave the Cardinals a 7-4 lead.

Colorado 4, Florida 2--Shortstop Alex Gonzalez’s eighth-inning error allowed the tying and go-ahead runs to score at Miami.

Marlin starter Alex Fernandez had been cruising with a 2-1 lead when the trouble started. With one out, Brent Mayne singled. Pinch-runner Brian Hunter advanced to third on a single by Aaron Ledesma.

After Tom Goodwin’s infield single loaded the bases, Mike Lansing hit a hard grounder that looked as if it would set up an inning-ending double play. Instead the ball skipped under Gonzalez’s glove into center field, allowing two runs to score.

Cincinnati 4, Chicago 3--Pokey Reese’s hard-hit single off third baseman Jeff Huson drove in the winning run in the bottom of the 11th at Cincinnati.