Dodgers Will Take Victory Any Way They Can Get It

The Dodgers didn’t earn any style points with Sunday’s 4-3, 13-inning win over the San Diego Padres before 34,553 in Qualcomm Stadium.

Not one of their four hits after the second inning left the infield, two fielding gaffes led to two Padre runs, they committed a costly mistake on the basepath, they failed to get a key sacrifice bunt down, and they scored the winning run on a chopper that should have been ruled dead because it nicked Brian Jordan’s foot in the batter’s box.

But when you’re starving for hits like the Dodgers, when you’re on the verge of getting swept by the Padres in a four-game series for the first time since 1992, and when you’re in danger of taking the field for your home opener with a 4 1/2-game deficit in the division, the Dodgers can’t be too picky about the aesthetics of a victory.

“We needed this win bad,” said closer Eric Gagne, who blanked San Diego in the 10th and 11th innings before yielding to Guillermo Mota, who earned the victory with two hitless innings. “It would have been bad to start the season with a four-game sweep.”

Mike Kinkade, who entered as part of a double switch in the 12th, sparked the winning rally with a one-out infield single off Jaret Wright in the 13th. Cesar Izturis reached on a bunt single, and Shawn Green walked to load the bases.

Jordan, who was hit by a pitch on the left hand in the 11th and could only grip the knob of the bat with two fingers in the 13th, topped a ball to third. Sean Burroughs charged but had trouble with the glove-to-hand transition. Because Kinkade got such a good jump off third, Burroughs’ only play was at first.

Kinkade scored for a 4-3 lead, and Mota, who mixed a 97-mph fastball with an improved changeup, retired the side in order in the bottom of the 13th to bring the 3-hour, 57-minute game to an end.

“It was ugly, but we came away with a win,” said Jordan, who will have X-rays taken of his hand today. “We definitely played sloppy. We made a couple of errors, some bad decisions. We were fortunate.”

No more so than in the 13th. Jordan said he felt the ball hit his foot, but the Padres didn’t even appeal the play to the umpires.

“I figured it would get the run in, so I kept running [to first],” Jordan said. “Whatever it takes, man. I was in pain. I was just trying to put the ball in play. It barely hit my foot, but I did feel it. We got lucky.”

From the sixth inning on, the teams played in the same kind of shadows that helped produce the Dodgers’ two-hit, 16-strikeout performance in Thursday’s 6-1 loss to the Padres.

“What do you do as a hitter in these conditions? Pray,” catcher Todd Hundley said. “You hope the pitcher doesn’t throw at your head, and you try not to embarrass yourself too much.”

No one got beaned Sunday, but as far as not embarrassing themselves ...

The Dodgers scored three runs in the second -- equaling their run total for the first three games of the series -- before the shadows took effect.

Jordan singled and took third on Fred McGriff’s single, Adrian Beltre doubled a run in, and Hundley ripped a two-run double off the wall in right-center for a 3-0 lead.

Cora followed with a liner to center that Hundley misjudged -- he was almost to third when Mark Kotsay made the catch. Hundley was doubled off second, Odalis Perez struck out, and the Dodger offense vanished, as 23 of their next 24 batters were retired.

McGriff’s throwing error in the second allowed the Padres to make it 3-1, and center fielder Dave Roberts lost Kotsay’s fifth-inning sinking liner in the background above home plate, turning what should have been a single into a ball that skipped past him and to the wall for a triple.

Kotsay scored on Rondell White’s groundout to make it 3-2, and the Padres tied it in the seventh on Dodger reliever Paul Shuey’s bases-loaded walk to Ryan Klesko. But as frustrating as the afternoon was for the Dodgers, there were no complaints about the ending.