Raising Arizona

The Arizona Diamondbacks closed the gas valve on the grill that barbecued Manager Bob Brenly this past week. Amazing what a little 15-run, 22-hit outburst at the World Series will do for a skipper’s peace of mind.

Torched for his pitching decisions during extra-inning losses in Games 4 and 5, Brenly morphed into Bill Walsh on Saturday night, overhauling his lineup with several moves that raised eyebrows before the game but made him look like an offensive genius after Arizona’s stunning 15-2 victory over the New York Yankees in Game 6 before 49,707 in Bank One Ballpark.

Randy Johnson gave up two runs on six hits and struck out seven in seven innings, and Arizona busted out for eight runs in the third inning, the biggest World Series inning in 33 years, as the Diamondbacks evened the best-of-seven series at three games apiece and forced a decisive Game 7 showdown tonight between Arizona right-hander Curt Schilling and Yankee right-hander Roger Clemens.

“I don’t know how I can describe what this is like to someone in the print media,” said Schilling, who guaranteed during a television interview Saturday that he would beat the Yankees if the series reached Game 7. “This might be like being in the essay finals against Hemingway or a paint-off against Picasso.

“It’s Roger Clemens and the Yankees in Game 7. Everyone who has ever played this sport at any level has had a Wiffle ball in their hand at some point and said, ‘It’s the seventh game of the World Series and you’re either pitching or hitting.’ How cool is that?”

Very cool for Brenly, who spent the past two games under an intense heat lamp while his 22-year-old closer, Byung-Hyun Kim, melted down. Kim gave up game-tying, two-out, two-run home runs in the ninth inning to Tino Martinez in Game 4 Wednesday night and Scott Brosius in Game 5 Thursday night. Derek Jeter’s 10th-inning homer off Kim won Game 4, and the Yankees won Game 5 in 12 innings.

Brenly was second-guessed for pulling Schilling in Game 4 after his ace threw only 88 pitches in seven innings. He was ripped for leaving Kim in long enough to throw 62 pitches in Game 4, the last of which Jeter hit for his walk-off home run.

Then Thursday night, Brenly was shredded for going to Kim again with a two-run lead in the ninth. A shellshocked Kim hung a fat slider to Brosius, who belted it for a two-run homer, sending the Diamondbacks on their way to another crushing defeat and a 3-2 deficit in the series.

“One of the things in hiring Bob is I knew he’d be a gut guy, I knew he wouldn’t go by the book, and that was one of the things that appealed to me,” Arizona owner Jerry Colangelo said. “I’ve always been that kind of owner, a risk-taker. You’ve got to be willing to walk out on the plank knowing you could fail. But high risk, high reward.”

The predominantly right-handed lineup Brenly threw at Yankee left-hander Andy Pettitte looked a little risky Saturday night. Danny Bautista in center field instead of Steve Finley was a no-brainer, but Jay Bell, who had one series at-bat, at second instead of National League championship series most valuable player Craig Counsell? And Greg Colbrunn, who had no series at-bats, at first instead of Mark Grace?

Was a few extra right-handed bats worth sacrificing Gold Glove-caliber defense on the right side of the infield in what was expected to be a low-scoring game? For Brenly, it was. Pettitte held Arizona lefties hitless in 11 at-bats with six strikeouts in Game 2.

“We watched some videotape from Game 2, and we thought our left-handers had very few good swings against Pettitte,” Brenly said. “Guys like Grace and Counsell, who hit lefties very well their whole careers, struggled against Pettitte.”

Bautista, Colbrunn and Bell did not Saturday night. Bautista had three hits and five runs batted in, including RBI singles in the first and second innings and a two-run single in the third. Colbrunn had two hits, two runs and an RBI. Bell had an RBI single in the third and scored two runs.

Reggie Sanders had four hits and an RBI, leadoff batter Tony Womack had two singles, a double and two RBIs, and Matt Williams became the first player in World Series history to double twice in one inning, the third.

Hitless in their previous 16 at-bats with runners in scoring position, the Diamondbacks went 12 for 22 in those situations Saturday night. Batting .196 in the series, Arizona set a World Series record for hits, breaking the previous mark of 20, set by the New York Giants in Game 3 against the Yankees in 1921 and the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 4 against the Boston Red Sox in 1946.

Ten Diamondbacks, including every starter, had at least one hit. Arizona battered Pettitte for six runs on seven hits in two innings and demolished reliever Jay Witasick for nine runs on nine hits in 11/3 innings.

After Johnson blew a 96-mph fastball by Jorge Posada with the bases loaded to end the top of the third, preserving a 4-0 lead, Arizona tore the game open with its eight-run third, the most runs in a Series inning since Detroit’s 10-run third in a 13-1 Game 6 victory over the Cardinals in 1968.

The Diamondbacks had a franchise-record nine hits in the inning, and even Johnson got in on the barrage with an RBI single.

“It was a shock for me,” Pettitte said. “To see that inning go on ... it was almost as amazing as the home runs that we hit in Games 4 and 5. Everything they hit was a base hit.”

Just for good measure, Arizona tacked on three runs in the fourth to make it 15-0, a lead large enough for even Kim had Brenly considered using him.

“It was very nice for a lot of different reasons, but the primary one is we’ve got a lot of guys swinging the bats well right now,” Brenly said. “Randy pitched well, [relievers] Bobby Witt and Troy Brohawn got to play in a World Series, [Dave] Dellucci got a hit. Because we have a lot of veteran guys, I wanted them to enjoy this for everything it was worth.

“Those three games in New York, it kind of got to the point where you wondered, when does the enjoyment start? Well, hopefully [Saturday] night they got a little taste of it and it will make them hungrier to do more of the same [tonight].”

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Running Score

Most runs scored by one team in a World Series game:

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Runs Team Year 18 N.Y. Yankees 1936 16 N.Y. Yankees 1960 15 Arizona 2001 15 Toronto 1993 14 Atlanta 1991 14 Philadelphia 1993 14 Florida 1997

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Game 7 / Today

Pitching Matchup: New York right-hander Roger Clemens vs. Arizona Diamondback right-hander Curt Schilling.

Time: 4:45 PST

TV: Channel 11