Dodgers Swept Under Rug as Pirates Hit Valdes Early

Pittsburgh’s batting practice was extended until about 7:45 Wednesday night, about 90 minutes longer than scheduled.

When you know what’s coming, it’s not all that hard to hit a pitch, as long as it isn’t being thrown by Pedro Martinez or Randy Johnson.

The Dodgers claimed that’s just what was happening, because by the time Ismael Valdes finished tossing up what had to look like balloons to Pirate hitters, they had enough runs for an 8-3 win before 28,462.

“He was up in the zone,” catcher Chad Kreuter said of his pitcher’s difficulty in the first inning. “He wasn’t getting ahead of guys like we were later.

“And I think he was tipping his pitches.”

So the Pirates had an idea of what was coming.

Or did they?

“If we did, I wouldn’t tell you,” Manager Gene Lamont said, laughing. “No, we really didn’t know. He was just getting behind guys. Or maybe we did know and nobody was telling me, I don’t know.”

Kreuter insisted there were symptoms.

“When you’re pitching in a fastball count and you throw a breaking ball and the batter doesn’t even flinch, then they know what’s coming,” he said.

“After the first inning, we were able to fix it.”

By then, the Dodgers were down, 4-0, and Pittsburgh had five hits. Valdes had seen every Pirate in the lineup, and vice versa, before he settled.

By the time Valdes left the mound, he had gone six innings and given up five runs and eight hits to run his record of futility to 2-7, 0-3 since rejoining the Dodgers, who fell 10 games behind San Francisco back in the NL West.

Still, there was perfection to be had, if not on the Dodger mound.

And certainly not in the Pirate infield, where on successive hitters in the second inning, third baseman Enrique Wilson threw a ball into the right-field seats to let in one Dodger run and shortstop Pat Meares threw one in the dirt at first base to let in another, making it 5-2.

Perfection came when, at game’s end, the Pirates finished six for six against the Dodgers and Padres in California, their first perfect trip anywhere since 1991 and their first sweep of the state since divisional play began in 1969.

“It seems like we’ve been out here two weeks,” Lamont said, plainly relishing a plane trip home that figured to be unexpectedly rollicking for a team that has struggled all season and a manager whose job apparently is in jeopardy.

But that team and the manager were helped, at least on the Dodger leg of the trip, by 28 runs in the three games.

They gave up only four.

“It seemed like we had momentum from the Philadelphia series, and then it stopped,” Dodger Manager Davey Johnson said. “We didn’t pitch very well, didn’t swing the bat well. . . . We really got whupped.”

It started early Wednesday when Valdes surrendered John Vander Wal’s RBI double, Wilson’s single that drove in two runs and Meares’ sacrifice fly before he was able to escape to the dugout.

It was 4-0, most were still making the trek from the parking lot and Valdes was shaking his head.

He fared slightly better in the second, giving up only Brian Giles’ run-scoring single after Adrian Brown led off with a double.

“When you have to play catch-up like we did the whole series, it’s tough,” Johnson said.

Said Lamont: “When you give up some runs like that early, it changes the way you have to play.”

It doesn’t help when your bats are moribund.

Valdes settled down, pitched like he did in shutting down Philadelphia on Friday and waited for the Dodger bats to awaken.

They slept through the second inning, when they scored twice without benefit of a hit. The awakening was brief, coming on Kevin Elster’s pinch-hit single that followed Alex Cora’s triple.

That was enough for Pirate starter Dan Serafini (2-3), who gave way to Scott Sauerbeck, who lulled the Dodger bats back to sleep.

Mike Fetters came on and struggled, giving up three runs and four hits in the eighth inning, somewhat restoring form in a series that gave the lowly Pirates a 5-4 advantage over the Dodgers in their nine matchups this season.