Dreifort Back Where He Left

The irony of the situation isn’t lost on Darren Dreifort or the Dodgers, who have waited almost two years for this moment.

The right-hander is scheduled to start tonight against the San Diego Padres at Qualcomm Stadium, marking his first regular-season appearance since he suffered a second torn pitching elbow here June 29, 2001.

“I was thinking about that the other day, that it’s kind of ironic that the place where he last pitched is the place where he’s going to begin again,” Manager Jim Tracy said. “Maybe that’s a good thing, to go right back to work again where we had to march him off the mound.”

Although Dreifort has had bad experiences against the Padres, he’s too eager to return to fret about anything.

“I know I haven’t had a lot of success here, and it happened here, but I actually like to pitch down here,” said Dreifort, 0-7 with one save and a 5.40 earned-run average against the Padres.

“Really, I’m not thinking about what’s happened here in the past or anything like that. The only thing I focused on is getting back on the mound in a major league game. That’s all that matters.”

The Dodgers are eagerly anticipating tonight’s game.

“Whatever he does,” pitching coach Jim Colborn said, “it’s cause for celebration.”

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Center fielder Dave Roberts is playing with a left knee injury that might require surgery after the season.

“Well, obviously that [surgery] would be a last option,” Roberts said. “I’m going to play this season out, stay on top of it with treatment and see how it goes.”

Roberts said he has tendinitis in his left knee, which he believes occurred when he “kind of tweaked it a little bit” while jogging in the off-season. The injury has not appeared to slow the speedy leadoff batter, who already has two triples, a stolen base and has made several nifty plays defensively. Trainer Stan Johnston is monitoring the situation.

“I know it’s not 100%, but it’s not preventing me from stealing bases, playing defense or from doing anything on the baseball field,” Roberts said.

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Kevin Brown, who has battled elbow and back problems the last two seasons, said he was fine Thursday after pitching six-plus strong innings in Wednesday’s 5-0 victory against the Arizona Diamondbacks at Bank One Ballpark.

“Other than hacking and coughing I’m great,” said Brown, who overpowered Arizona despite being weakened by a cold. “I haven’t been plagued with injuries my whole career, everything has happened the last couple of seasons.

“It’s all just part of the process that I’ve had to go through, and that’s what I’m doing now.”

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Reliever Guillermo Mota is glad to be back.

Mota on Thursday completed his suspension, reduced from five games to four, for intentionally hitting New York Met catcher Mike Piazza with a pitch in spring training.

[Friday] is going to be a big day,” said Mota, expected to play a key role in the bullpen. “I’m glad it’s over and I can get back to the game again.”

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Rookie left-hander Steve Colyer was optioned to triple-A Las Vegas after pitching 2 2/3 innings in his major league debut, giving up five hits and one run. The club purchased the contract of infielder Ron Coomer from Las Vegas.