Garciaparra Gets a Break Today

Nomar Garciaparra started Wednesday at first base for the Dodgers, after leaving Tuesday’s game because of a strained oblique muscle. He also is playing with a strained quadriceps muscle, and he grimaced noticeably upon reaching first after a single in the first inning. The ball caromed off the wall 390 feet away, but first base was as far as he could run.

In the sixth inning, he aggravated the oblique injury as he jerked away from an inside fastball. He left the game in the seventh, and Manager Grady Little told him he would not start today, in the hope he can play all three games in San Francisco this weekend, if needed.

Would he play if this were June?

“I don’t know,” Garciaparra said before the game. “It’s not June, so I’m not really thinking about it.”

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Brad Penny starts the biggest game of his Dodgers career today, but he was in no mood to talk about it, or about his second-half struggles, when reporters approached him Wednesday.

“I don’t care,” he said, then walked away.

After earning the All-Star game start by going 10-2 with a 2.91 earned-run average in the first half, Penny is 6-7 with a 5.99 ERA in the second half, with opponents hitting .311 off him. And, in the most troublesome trend for a team with unreliable middle relief, he has failed to complete six innings in six of his last seven starts.

Pitching coach Rick Honeycutt says Penny is sound physically and has not lost velocity but sometimes tries to throw as hard as he can when a slower pitch might get him out of trouble. Also, Honeycutt said, Penny has been unable to make the key pitch that stops a big inning from developing.

“His breaking ball has been on and off,” Little said. “His fastball is always there, but the location of his fastball is not as consistent.”

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The Dodgers will return to the California League next season and will no longer field a minor league team at Dodgertown.

They have reached an agreement under which the Tampa Bay Devil Rays will move one of their Class-A teams to Vero Beach, Fla., a source said Wednesday. The Dodgers will shift that team to the California League, restoring a minor league affiliate to their home state for the first time in seven years.

The Dodgers could sign up with Inland Empire (San Bernardino), High Desert (Adelanto), Lancaster or Visalia.

The team with which they plan to affiliate was unclear late Wednesday, but an announcement is expected soon. The Dodgers will keep their triple-A team in Las Vegas and their double-A team in Jacksonville, Fla.

The Dodgers have fielded a minor league team in Vero Beach since 1980. They are considering whether to vacate Dodgertown entirely and move their spring training headquarters to Arizona.

The Dodgers affiliated with a California League team from 1963 to 2000, in San Bernardino, Bakersfield, Lodi and Santa Barbara.

bill.shaikin@latimes.com