Giants Find Milwaukee to Their Liking

Milwaukee’s County Stadium always seems to cure the San Francisco Giants’ offensive blues.

The Giants took sole possession of first place in the National League West and emerged from a lengthy slump by getting 17 hits in a 13-8 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers Tuesday night.

Barry Bonds and Jeff Kent homered for the Giants, who hit only .180 in the first 10 games of their 12-game trip. But the Giants, who had an 11-run inning in a trip to Milwaukee in May, had few problems against Brewer starter John Snyder and Milwaukee’s bullpen in a sloppy game featuring five errors and six unearned runs.

“Some guys had some big offensive nights,” Giant Manager Dusty Baker said. “We’ve been due for a performance like this. There were a lot of runs given away out there, but we’ll take it.”

With Arizona’s 4-2 loss to the Braves, San Francisco moved into first place alone for the first time this season.

The Giants won their second in row and improved to 6-5 on the trip, their longest of the season.

Bobby Estalella’s bases-loaded walk in the eighth broke a 7-7 tie and began a five-run rally. J.T. Snow had four hits and doubled to start the rally, which was extended by two Milwaukee errors that led to three unearned runs.

Colorado 2, Chicago 1--Todd Hollandsworth hit a go-ahead RBI single in his debut with the Rockies and former Dodger Pedro Astacio matched his career high with 12 strikeouts at Chicago.

Hollandsworth, acquired from the Dodgers for Tom Goodwin on Monday, broke a 1-1 tie in the eighth to give the Rockies their sixth win in 20 games since the All-Star break.

Astacio (9-7), the subject of many trade rumors before Monday’s deadline, held the Cubs to two hits and four walks over seven innings.

Eric Young, who in 1997 was traded by the Rockies to the Dodgers for Astacio, had the only two hits Astacio surrendered a double to lead off the first and a single to lead off the sixth.

Montreal 4, St. Louis 0--The Expos finally backed up a good pitching performance with some timely hitting and ended a seven-game losing streak in the game at Montreal.

Vladimir Guerrero hit a three-run homer and Trey Moore pitched five shutout innings in his first appearance in more than two years.

Moore (1-0), making his first appearance since June 6, 1998, gave up two hits and three walks, and struck out eight.

He missed the entire 1999 season after having arthroscopic off-season surgery on his left shoulder.

New York 3, Cincinnati 2--Mike Hampton pitched 7 1/3 strong innings and drove in a run and new shortstop Mike Bordick had three hits and an RBI for the Mets at New York.

Hampton (11-7) gave up two runs and eight hits to help end the Reds’ four-game winning streak. The left-hander struck out six and did not walk a batter.

The Reds chased Hampton in the eighth after he gave up a leadoff single to Chris Stynes and an RBI double to Barry Larkin. The Reds scored one run off Turk Wendell before John Franco came on to get the Mets out of the inning.

Houston 4, Florida 3--Scott Elarton came within two outs of his first career shutout and the Astros held on to win at Miami.

Elarton (11-4) gave up three runs, five hits, and struck out seven in 8 1/3 innings to win his seventh game in eight starts, and his eighth since June 5.

Florida’s Chuck Smith (1-4) took a no-hitter into the sixth inning before giving up four unearned runs.

The Astros didn’t do any celebrating because of the knee injury to Craig Biggio, who is out for the season. Biggio was injured when he landed hard after colliding with Florida’s Preston Wilson at second in the seventh.

San Diego 10, Philadelphia 9--Kevin Nicholson singled to drive in the deciding run with two outs in the 10th inning as the Padres won despite blowing an eight-run lead at San Diego.

The Padres led 9-1 after six innings before Philadelphia rallied. The Phillies tied it in the ninth on two-out homers by Scott Rolen and Pat Burrell off closer Trevor Hoffman, who blew his fifth save since June 23.