Park Can’t Find a Groove

This time, there were no questions about a grooved pitch.

The inquiries this time focused on Chan Ho Park’s slew of bad pitches Friday night in his worst outing of the season.

Park, who conspiracy theorists thought had purposely given the retiring Cal Ripken Jr. a fat pitch to hit a home run with in Tuesday’s All-Star game, was battered around by the Oakland Athletics in an 11-7 interleague loss in front of 28,627 at Network Associates Coliseum.

The Dodgers (48-42) have lost five of six games since winning nine straight.

Park (8-6), who had gone at least six innings in 18 of 19 starts this season, went 3 1/3 innings against Oakland and gave up a season-high seven runs on eight hits. He struck out six but walked four while throwing an outlandish 97 pitches.

Park, the losing pitcher for the National League this week, has not won since beating the Angels, 6-2, on June 15 at Edison Field.

Was being a first-time all-star a distraction?

“I thought about that,” Park said. “It was new and it doesn’t help me for focus, concentration. I need to be really focused. I just made too many pitches.

“I was thinking too much about strikes and they had more patience.”

Said Dodger Manager Jim Tracy: “Chan Ho just didn’t have it tonight. But whenever you have 15 consecutive quality starts, at some point you’re going to have one that’s not quite up to par. Tonight just happened to be that one.

“Tonight was one of those nights. He struggled some with the command of his fastball, obviously, and got behind some guys.”

Chad Kreuter, Park’s catcher, said he was falling behind batters early and often.

“We didn’t get ahead of guys,” Kreuter said. “We were behind, not getting fastballs for strikes, not even the curveball when we needed it.”

The Athletics (46-43), who have won five straight and 11 of 14, are starting to play like the team that was supposed to challenge for a World Series berth, rather than a squad battling to stay above .500. Every Oakland player scored at least one run Friday night and the Athletics have pounded Dodger pitching for 29 hits over the first two games of the series.

Oakland starter Tim Hudson (10-5) earned the win after giving up four runs on five hits in six innings. He struck out seven and walked two.

Oakland closer Jason Isringhausen worked 1 2/3 scoreless innings for his 18th save.

It took only three batters for the Athletics to score on Park.

After walking the first batter he faced, Johnny Damon, Park balked, allowing Damon to move to second base. Jeremy Giambi’s one-out flare single to right scored Damon.

The Athletics added another run in the second inning.

With one out, Ramon Hernandez singled off Park before No. 9 hitter Billy McMillon hit a long fly to deep right field. Shawn Green, a former Gold Glove winner with the Toronto Blue Jays, gave chase and seemed to have a beat on it but hit the wall at the same time as the ball and fell on his backside. McMillon cruised into third with a run-scoring triple.

Oakland chased Park with a five-run fourth inning.

After Hernandez led off with a single and McMillon’s ground-ball double went past a prone Eric Karros at first base, Park walked Damon to load the bases with none out.

Frank Menechino bounced back to Park, who threw home to get Hernandez on the force out.

But Park then walked Jeremy Giambi to force in McMillon before Jason Giambi, who went four for five, nearly hit a grand slam.

The left-handed hitting Jason Giambi went the other way, hitting the top of the left-center wall for a two-run single as Jeremy, for some reason, was not running on the play and only made it to second. Jason yelled at his younger brother as the play ended, motioning him toward third before standing on first base with his arms crossed.

The Dodgers scored in the sixth inning when Green hit a two-out grand slam, his team-leading 21st homer of the year, sending it deep into the right-field seats.

Green’s fifth career grand slam, his third as a Dodger, was his first since May 29, 2000, when he hit one against the New York Mets. It also ended a 16-inning Dodger scoreless streak.

Hudson had not allowed a homer in 46 2/3 innings before Green’s hit. Hudson improved his career record to 41-13, the .759 winning percentage the best in major league history for a pitcher with at least 50 decisions.

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NL WEST STANDINGS

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W L GB Arizona 52 37 -- Dodgers 48 42 4.5 San Francisco 47 43 5.5

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