Penny Falters When He’s Needed Most

This was his moment. This was his mandate.

This was why Brad Penny is paid an average of $8.5 million a season and treated as the cornerstone of the Dodgers’ pitching staff, for nights like Saturday, cool fall evenings when championship pitchers dominate crunch-time games.

A week remaining. A playoff berth at stake. A losing team in town. One of only five pitchers to beat the New York Yankees twice in a World Series on the mound.

This was Brad Penny’s moment.

And he mangled it.

A guy who has haunted the Dodgers all season with his temper tantrums threw a different kind of fit.

Instead of fighting with the manager, he fought with his fastball.

Instead of confronting teammates, he confronted his control.

Instead of barking at umpires, he barked up fat full-count pitches.

Brad Penny needed to prove he was worth the trouble.

But, once again, he was more trouble than he was worth.

Continuing a slide that has taken him from All-Star game starter to all-vacant-stare starter, Penny pitched the Dodgers out of a game, out of a playoff spot in the standings, and pretty much out of their minds.

Handed a 3-0 lead against the Arizona Diamondbacks, a team against which he had a 1.51 career earned-run average, Penny handed it right back and then some in a 9-3 defeat that was as oversized as Grady Little’s grimace.

In the afternoon, the wild-card chasing Philadelphia Phillies won.

During the middle of the evening, the National League West-leading San Diego Padres won.

Thus, late Saturday night, the Dodgers’ loss landed them completely outside the postseason for the first time in weeks.

With seven games remaining, the Dodgers no longer control their own postseason destiny, they need help.

Because Brad Penny, when he was needed most, gave them none.

“It was just tough luck today,” said Penny softly afterward.

Give him credit for waiting in street clothes until reporters arrived to question him.

But wonder, perhaps, if he’s not taking this new mellow approach a little too seriously.

“Anytime you lose it’s a tough loss,” he said. “If we’re good enough at the end, we’ll get there.”

He allowed four earned runs and lasted only five innings in a line that could be a eulogy to the Dodgers’ season.

Since Aug. 18, he is 4-4 with a 6.75 ERA in a line that could be a farewell notice to his Dodgers career.

Penny has two more seasons left on his contract, but if the Dodgers can pick up a big bat for his still-enormous potential, they will be mighty tempted.

Before the game, Dodgers General Manager Ned Colletti, speaking generally, said, “This club was built around the idea that we have players who are comfortable playing in big games in September, players who can walk the walk.”

Penny picked a lousy time to keep stumbling.

In the first inning, he may have been distracted by a possible twinge in his back. Little saw enough of a wince to jog to the mound with assistant trainer Matt Wilson, although Penny shooed them away and said he was fine.

Then, with a 3-0 lead in the top of the second, he may have been distracted when Russell Martin missed his strike three pitch to Chad Tracy, allowing Tracy to take first base.

But, whatever, he wasn’t the guy who three Octobers ago stared down the mighty Yankees.

This time, he couldn’t even stare down Carlos Quentin, allowing the rookie to hit a tying two-run homer in the second inning and later saying, “I don’t even know who that was.”

This time, he couldn’t battle the legends that are Orlando Hudson and Johnny Estrada, allowing each full-count hits that led to another run in the third.

And this time, he couldn’t handle the giant that is Eric Byrnes, who began the night with one hit in six at-bats against Penny, but who peppered him for two hits, including a single in the middle of the run-scoring fourth.

“It just didn’t happen for him tonight,” said Little of Penny.

The manager was as kind as always when talking about his pitcher, but you know he was watching. You know the entire Dodgers front office was watching.

You know everyone was wondering.

“I’ve never judged a person on one day in his life, and never will,” said Little before the game, then added, “In September, though, there is some judging you can do.”

On this night, in the case of the Dodgers’ biggest, most bewildering pitcher, the verdict was clear.

Extra Points

* Amazing but true: the Angels have a better record than the Dodgers.

Of course, how would you know?

The Dodgers are front page, the Angels are tire ads. The Dodgers are talking miracles, the Angels are talking vacation. The Dodgers are making us hold our breath, the Angels are making us yawn.

To put this in words that Angels owner Arte Moreno might understand, the Angels are a colorful freeway billboard that has been slowly covered up by the branches of a venerable old tree.

It’s all about buzz around here, and the Angels have lost it, with only themselves to blame.

At least now when it comes time to gulp and swallow the contract of an expensive free-agent hitter this winter, they will be aware of the high price of perception.

* Neither the American flop at the Ryder Cup nor the U.S. men’s flop at the world basketball championships was a true indicator of how the world has caught up to America in its traditional team sports.

The true indicator was earlier last week, when Russia broke the American women’s 51-game winning streak in world basketball championships and Olympics.

Remember, American women won titles in the 2004 Athens Olympics in basketball, softball, soccer and beach volleyball, and have long been the most dominant team sports entity in the world.

Bolstered by Title IX, America always made more of a commitment to women’s team sports than other country.

As in everything else, we have since eased up, while the rest of the world has wised up.

* Nobody was tougher Saturday than Penn State Coach Joe Paterno, who, despite suffering from flu, stood in an Ohio rainstorm for 1 1/2 quarters before finally sprinting across the field and into the locker room.

Our heroes are never so special as when they are human.

*

Bill Plaschke can be reached at bill.plaschke@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Plaschke, go to latimes.com/plaschke.