Karros’ Home Run in Ninth Wins Game, Ties Campanella

The Dodgers’ pursuit of the National League West title officially ended Wednesday. San Francisco eliminated them by defeating Cincinnati.

But the Dodgers still managed to keep alive their faint wild-card hopes with their second consecutive 1-0 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks in front of 31,630 at Dodger Stadium.

Eric Karros led off the bottom of the ninth by slamming a 2-0 pitch off Arizona reliever Byung-Hyun Kim (6-6) into the Dodger bullpen in left field. It was Karros’ 31st home run and 105th RBI. It was also the 242nd homer of Karros’ career, tying him with Roy Campanella for third on the all-time Dodger list.

By sweeping the Diamondbacks, winning all three games in their final at-bat, the Dodgers moved past Arizona into second place in the West. The win was the sixth in a row for the Dodgers, equaling their best stretch of the season. Arizona lost its fifth in a row.

Matt Herges (11-3), the Dodgers’ third pitcher, got the win. All of Herges’ victories this season have come in relief.

“We had our good luck charm with Herges,” Dodgers Manager Davey Johnson said. “It seems every time he pitches an inning, we score.”

Roxie Campanella, Roy’s widow, was in attendance and spoke with Karros after the game.

“I love him,” Roxie Campanella said of Karros. “He’s a great guy and a good role model. Roy would love for him to break his record because Roy would have liked his character.”

“I don’t pretend to believe I belong in the same company as Campanella,” said Karros, who hit his first home run since Aug. 28. “I feel very fortunate. The bottom line is we’ve been playing well lately and hopefully it can continue.”

Before the game, Johnson said the team had to win of all its remaining 10 games to have a shot at the wild card. “We’d have to have 90 wins to have a realistic chance,” he said.

Any combination of five Met wins and or Dodger losses would officially eliminate the Dodgers from the wild-card chase.

Diamondbacks starter Randy Johnson threw seven shutout innings. He gave up five hits and struck out eight, raising his league-leading total to 334.

But he was denied joining the Cardinals’ Darryl Kile and the Braves’ Tom Glavine as a 19-game winner because the Diamondbacks couldn’t push across a run against the Dodgers’ Darren Dreifort.

In his 30th start, a career high for a single season, Dreifort blanked Arizona for 7 2/3 innings, allowing seven hits. He walked two and struck out seven before giving way to Terry Adams.

With Dreifort’s outing, the Dodger starting pitching has strung together 24 1/3 scoreless innings. The last run off a Dodger starter was Sunday, when Colorado’s Butch Huskey homered off Luke Prokopec in the fifth.

Dreifort worked around five Arizona singles in the first three innings, then retired 14 consecutive batters.