Dodgers Fall Back in Line

Barry Bonds hit the longest home run in Pacific Bell Park history in the second inning Monday night, and the Dodgers responded by intentionally walking the San Francisco Giant slugger with a runner on first in the fifth.

Perhaps the Dodgers should have taken a similar tack with No. 8 hitter David Bell, who had three hits, including a tiebreaking two-run home run in the sixth, to lead the Giants to a 6-5 victory over the Dodgers before a sellout crowd of 40,740.

After chasing the Dodgers for almost a month, the Giants finally pulled even with them atop the National League wild-card standings. Both the Dodgers and Giants--who will meet six more times over the next 10 days--are 5 1/2 games behind first-place Arizona in the NL West.

“I don’t think [the Giants gained] any kind of psychological edge by catching us,” Dodger first baseman Eric Karros said. “This is going to be fun. Would we like to be up by 10 games? Sure. But you come to the park every day knowing there’s going to be a playoff atmosphere, that one pitch, one at-bat, one play here or there can turn the game around.”

Monday night, most of those critical at-bats came with Bell at the plate. Livan Hernandez (10-15) threw seven strong innings, giving up three runs and six hits and striking out five, and closer Robb Nen recorded his franchise-record 200th save, but it was Bell, the unheralded third baseman, who was most responsible for extending the Giants’ win streak to four and the Dodgers’ losing streak to three.

“Bell killed us,” Karros said. “He just wore us out from that eight hole.”

Eight-hole batters rarely get much to hit because the pitcher follows them in the lineup, but that didn’t seem to deter Dodger starter Odalis Perez (13-9). Bell singled and scored in the third inning, hit a two-out RBI single in the fourth and followed Ramon Martinez’s one-out single in the sixth with his 20th homer of the season to snap a 3-3 tie.

San Francisco, which has won 16 of its last 21 games, added an insurance run off reliever Paul Shuey in the seventh when Rich Aurilia tripled to left-center and scored on Jeff Kent’s sacrifice fly, the 1,000th run batted in of Kent’s career.

That turned out to be the deciding run after the Dodgers rallied for two runs in the top of the eighth, an inning aided by Bonds’ fielding error. Shawn Green singled with one out, and Adrian Beltre snapped an 0-for-21 skid with a single to left. The ball rolled under Bonds’ glove, allowing Green to score and Beltre to take second.

Beltre advanced on reliever Felix Rodriguez’s wild pitch, and Brian Jordan popped to second. Karros greeted Nen with an RBI single to center, making it 6-5, but Nen got pinch-hitter Dave Hansen to ground out and retired the Dodgers in the ninth for his 37th save of the season.

“Give some credit to David Bell--he had a great night against us offensively, and it hurt us,” Dodger Manager Jim Tracy said. “They got some big runs from the bottom of their lineup.”

And one prodigious run from the middle.

Perez, the Dodger left-hander, pitches with a lot of bravado--confidence may be the primary reason he has emerged as one of baseball’s best young pitchers this season--and he refuses to back down to anyone.

Perez tried to slip a first-pitch fastball by Bonds in the second inning, and Bonds sent it on a space mission, smashing a towering solo home run to straightaway center that traveled an estimated 491 feet, the longest in stadium history.

That gave Bonds 43 homers this season and 610 in his career.

Aurilia’s RBI single in the third made it 2-0, but the Dodgers evened the score in the top of the fourth inning on Brian Jordan’s two-run double, which followed singles by Paul Lo Duca and Green.

So began a familiar pattern for the Dodgers, who fell behind again in the bottom of the fourth, tied it, 3-3, in the top of the sixth when Karros legged out an RBI infield single, fell behind on Bell’s homer in the bottom of the sixth and came up just short in the end.

Tracy expects nothing less from the remaining six Dodger-Giant games, as a rivalry that spanned some 70 years in New York and another 40 or so on the West Coast resumes with a playoff berth on the line.

“It can be draining, it can be exhilarating--it’s an emotional roller coaster,” Tracy said of the NL West race.

“Everything takes on a larger meaning. Every play has more importance. But it’s an opportunity to get a taste of what it would be like to play in October.”

But if the Dodgers somehow reach October, and it’s anything like Monday night, they’re going to need a bulk-sized portion of antacid tablets.