Dodgers Are Baffled by Batista

Familiarity didn’t help the Dodgers against Miguel Batista and the Toronto Blue Jays in a 4-0 interleague loss Wednesday night at SkyDome.

The former Arizona Diamondback pitcher dominated the Dodgers in his third career shutout, tossing a four-hitter with eight strikeouts in a 1-hour 57-minute game -- the fastest in the major leagues this season -- in front of 18,003.

“Just filthy,” said center fielder Milton Bradley, who struck out to end the game. “With him, you just have to eliminate something and look for one thing. But everything he threw tonight was filthy.”

Batista (4-4) overwhelmed his onetime National League West rivals with an assortment of sharp pitches while helping Toronto take the first two games of the series and sending the Dodgers to their third consecutive loss on the trip.

“I was getting the ball over the plate more consistently and getting my movement,” said Batista, who improved to 5-6 with a 3.08 earned-run average in 26 games (13 starts) against the Dodgers. “After that I was just cruising along.”

The Blue Jays (27-32) capitalized on their few opportunities against Dodger starter Jose Lima (4-2), who pitched seven innings, taking command with a three-run fourth and adding a run in the seventh on Howie Clark’s second home run of the series. Before Wednesday, Lima had not given up an earned run in 20 2/3 innings. But he couldn’t keep pace with Batista.

“His splitter and his cutter ... he was throwing them hard,” Adrian Beltre said. “He used to throw 89, 90 [mph]. Tonight, he was throwing everything 92, 93. We weren’t looking for that kind of pitch today.”

The Dodgers (30-26), who fell into second place behind the San Diego Padres, went quietly for the second night in a row after also struggling against left-hander Ted Lilly in the opener.

“This guy is no stranger to us, and we’ve seen that before,” Manager Jim Tracy said of Batista. “Not in this uniform, obviously, but we have seen that before. He’s been a very tough customer for us over the course of the last couple of years.

“Tonight, he threw his curveball for strikes, and his cutter was good. His command ... I’ve seen it be that good, but I haven’t seen it be a whole lot better in other starts that he’s had against us. He completely dominated us tonight.”

Batista threw 72 strikes in 113 pitches. The right-hander, who signed with Toronto in December after three seasons with Arizona, retired the Dodgers in order in the second, fourth and fifth. He faced three batters over the minimum.

After going hitless in nine at-bats with runners in scoring position in Tuesday’s 7-1 loss, the Dodgers stranded Juan Encarnacion at second base in the third Wednesday after he doubled to start the inning. Alex Cora was nailed trying to stretch a one-out single into a double in the sixth, and Dave Roberts, who had a leadoff single in the ninth, wandered into a double play when he walked off the second base bag on Cesar Izturis’ grounder to first base.

“I really don’t know what happened, you’re going to have to ask him that,” Tracy said. “We saw him step back off the base. I saw [first base coach John Shelby] screaming at him and hollering, and we were screaming and hollering from the bench.

“He slid into [the bag], stepped up and started to step back toward first base. My guess would be that he maybe assumed that the ball was caught on the liner.”

Said Roberts: “I looked around, and I thought I had got doubled up. We’ll just leave it at that.” Roberts preferred to praise Batista.

“He’s never thrown like he threw tonight,” Roberts said. “He had good command, and his ball was just electric.

“When he wanted to, he’d throw a 95-, 96-mph fastball. It’s tough to put hits together. I think we had one opportunity the whole game.”