Dodgers are still fenced in

PHOENIX -- The ball looked like it had a chance, and when Andre Ethier saw it caught at the warning track as he was rounding first base, he stopped, kicked dirt and slammed his helmet to the ground.

What nearly was a score-tying three-run home run in the seventh inning went down as a simple F-9.

So it went for the Dodgers, the swing that could change the game never coming Tuesday night in their 10-5 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Their flailing offense was shut down on this night by Doug Davis, who was two days away from surgery to remove a cancerous thyroid gland.

The loss was the third in the last four games for the Dodgers, who got their only meaningful runs on a two-run double by Jeff Kent in the sixth that reduced their deficit to 5-2.

The Diamondbacks blew the game open an inning later by pounding Ramon Troncoso for four runs.

Andruw Jones continued to struggle, his 0-for-3 night dropping his average to .103. Like Ethier, Jones didn’t conceal his frustration, staring at home plate umpire Ron Kulpa upon being called out on strikes with Kent on second in the sixth.

The Dodgers were two for 11 with runners in scoring position, making them five for 31 in such situations over their last four games. They left nine runners on base.

“We were fighting uphill,” Manager Joe Torre said. “The last couple of nights, we fell behind early and every time we cut the margin, they kept extending it.”

With their offense having been held to three or fewer runs in five of their first seven games, the Dodgers got the kind of start from Chad Billingsley that they could ill afford.

Billingsley served up a three-run home run to Mark Reynolds in the first inning. The homer was Reynolds’ third in the series, which concludes today, and fifth of the season, the most in the majors.

Billingsley never made it out of the third inning, when he gave up two more runs, and left the game with the bases loaded and the score 5-0.

Reliever Hong-Chih Kuo forced Chris Young to ground into an inning-ending double play to prevent further damage.

Billingsley threw 70 pitches to get seven outs, only 32 for strikes. He walked three batters, all of them in the second inning to load the bases, and hit two others. Four of his five runs were earned.

“It was a battle from the first pitch,” Billingsley said. “I rushed myself. I was overly aggressive. I was tense, I never really relaxed.”

Torre suggested that the disruption of Billingsley’s routine last week might have been responsible for his troubles.

The start was the first of the season for Billingsley, who was scratched from his scheduled start last Wednesday because there was a threat of rain. Billingsley pitched one-third of an inning in relief that night against the San Francisco and also pitched the final two innings of a win at San Diego on Saturday.

But control problems weren’t Billingsley’s alone on Tuesday, as Kuo and Troncoso also plunked batters.

Davis had no such issues despite facing what Torre, himself a cancer survivor, called “a more important game coming up.” Davis gave up two runs and six hits in six innings and also had a big day at the plate, collecting two hits and driving in a run.

Torre, who underwent surgery for prostate cancer in 1999, said he felt an affinity for Davis. He recalled his fears upon hearing his own diagnosis, saying, “The only connection with cancer is death in your mind when you hear it.”

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dylan.hernandez@latimes.com