Dodgers Nailed by Carpenter

As a baseball statistic, it’s an endangered species. The Dodgers have one all season.

Yet Chris Carpenter of the St. Louis Cardinals made a complete game look as easy as 1-2-3 Friday night. In fact, the Dodgers went in order seven times in a 5-0 Cardinals victory at Busch Stadium that took all of two hours and eight minutes.

It mattered not at all that rookie Matt Kemp was sent to triple A before the game to open a spot for veteran left-handed hitter Ricky Ledee. It mattered not that the Dodgers fielded the lineup expected to take them down the stretch.

Carpenter carved them up, facing 29 batters and allowing three baserunners. Rafael Furcal and Cesar Izturis each singled and Jeff Kent was hit by a pitch, then erased by a double play. Nomar Garciaparra went 0 for 3, ending his hitting streak at 22 games.

“He changes speeds really well,” Dodgers catcher Russell Martin said of Carpenter. “He doesn’t mess around. He doesn’t get deep into counts.”

It was Carpenter’s first complete game this season, but wasn’t completely out of character. Last season the right-hander had seven, the lowest total ever for a National League leader.

Twenty years ago, Dodgers left-hander Fernando Valenzuela led the league with 20 complete games. He had 90 in his first seven seasons. Maybe it cost him the life in his arm. Maybe it didn’t. But most pitchers today won’t take the chance.

Neither will most managers. Grady Little watched enviously from the visiting dugout as Carpenter worked quickly and efficiently, needing only 101 pitches. The Dodgers bullpen has been ground to a nub because the starters rarely get past the sixth inning.

The only Dodger to notch a complete game is Derek Lowe, and he couldn’t get an out in the seventh against the Cardinals, leaving with a 4-0 deficit.

Lowe (7-6) had trouble with the top of the order. Leadoff hitter David Eckstein had four hits and second batter Chris Duncan had three, including a two-run home run off a curve in the third inning.

Lowe said he has been throwing too many breaking balls to left-handed hitters, abandoning his best pitch, his sinker.

“I’ve been going away from my strength,” he said. “I’m giving hitters too much credit.”

The closest the Dodgers came to hurting Carpenter (8-4) was when Andre Ethier’s bat broke on a groundout and the barrel windmilled a few feet over the pitcher’s head.

It seemed as if every ball they hit well ended up in the glove of center fielder Jim Edmonds. He made two over-the-shoulder catches near the wall and sprawled to snag a sinking liner by Martin.

“If we hit it good to center field he caught it, and if we didn’t hit it good and felt like it would fall in, he caught those too,” Little said.

Ledee had his first at-bat since suffering a groin injury May 1, grounding out in the ninth. Sending Kemp down was a tough decision, but the Dodgers weren’t comfortable with the alternative, which was to have backup catcher Sandy Alomar Jr. fudge an injury and go on the disabled list.

The hardest part for Kemp was telling his mother, who had driven to St. Louis from Oklahoma City for the series. Kemp batted .333 with seven home runs in his first 23 games after being called up from double A on May 28, but he hit only .181 in his last 44 at-bats with 16 strikeouts.

“I proved to everybody I could handle the major league level,” he said. “I know what they expect out of me. I’ll be back up here.”

Where will the Dodgers be when he returns? They fell to 46-44 after losing their second in a row and will be lucky to leave here Sunday afternoon above .500

Still, Little hasn’t lost his sense of humor.

“On the bright side, we didn’t make any mistakes running the bases, we only left two runners on base and we didn’t miss any signs,” he said.