The Fall Continues for Green, Dodgers

Three days after saying he wouldn’t “overreact to it in a negative manner to create uncertainty or doubt,” Jim Tracy reversed course Friday regarding Shawn Green’s season-long slump.

The Dodger manager dropped his cleanup hitter to fifth in the batting order, and Green responded with perhaps his most disappointing performance of the season during a 2-0 loss to the Atlanta Braves before 27,194 at Turner Field.

Batting lower in the order than he had in nearly three years, Green finished hitless in four at-bats and was one of two Dodgers to ground into an inning-ending double play with the bases loaded. He left without speaking to reporters after the Dodgers lost their eighth consecutive game for the first time since June 1992, when they lost 10 in a row.

Green was only part of the problem in a lineup that generated several scoring opportunities but could not capitalize as the Dodgers were shut out for the second consecutive game and the third time in six games. Alex Cora also grounded into an inning-ending double play with the bases loaded and grounded out to end the game with the potential tying run on first base.

“We had more chances to score runs than they did,” said Tracy, whose team has failed to score in 20 innings.

Odalis Perez, who had limited his former team to two hits through six innings, needed 32 pitches to get through a seventh in which he allowed Chipper Jones’ solo homer to left-center.

The Dodgers, who remained percentage points ahead of the slumping San Diego Padres atop the National League West, managed to load the bases twice with one out off an atypically wild Russ Ortiz, only to come up empty each time.

Adrian Beltre, who replaced Green in the cleanup spot, led off the second with a single, went to second on Juan Encarnacion’s one-out single and took third on Jason Grabowski’s walk. Cora then grounded into a 4-6-3 double play.

Ortiz gave up a walk to load the bases in the sixth before Green grounded into a 6-4-3 double play. Green is hitting .157 in May and .219 overall.

“We got beat the last seven games,” catcher Paul Lo Duca said. “Tonight was a little tough because we swung the bats well. Alex hit a ball right on the button. Greenie hit his ball on the button. A ball maybe a foot to the right, a foot to the left and we score four or five runs.”

Friday marked the lowest Green had hit in the order since batting sixth on July 20, 2001, and the first time he had hit fifth since June 23 of the same season.

Tracy said he made the move “to take some of the stress load off of Shawn,” insisting Green would resume hitting cleanup once he regains his stroke. Tracy said it usually doesn’t take much to get Green going. “He’s the type of hitter where it can be like this, he can have one at-bat and the metamorphosis that takes place from there is uncanny to witness,” Tracy said.

Perez needed only 72 pitches to get through the sixth, having faced one batter over the minimum. J.D. Drew singled in the second but was out on a double play, and Mark DeRosa doubled in the third but was caught stealing. Nick Green, who walked in the sixth, was the first baserunner the Braves stranded.

Perez’s pitch to Jones in the seventh was low, but the slugger reached out and golfed it into the stands.

“Sometimes a hitter will take a pitch that isn’t right down the middle and still do something with it,” Tracy said. “When you’re in a situation where you have no breathing room, it can really hurt.”

The Braves added a run in the eighth after shortstop Cesar Izturis, playing in with runners on first and third and nobody out, fielded a grounder by Jesse Garcia and appeared to have time to get Nick Green at the plate. But Izturis’ high throw nicked off Lo Duca’s glove, allowing Green to score.

Tracy said he didn’t consider this the toughest stretch of his Dodger tenure even though the team has lost more games than ever before under his leadership.

“I think we lost seven in a row last year,” he said. “One more doesn’t feel any different than seven, I can tell you that.”

Said Lo Duca: “The morale in here is all right. This kind of stuff happens to every team, it’s just a little bit longer than you want.”