Dodgers run out of players on a long night vs. Rockies

When the Yankees stumbled out of the gate last season reliever Scott Proctor remembers the manager urging his team to be patient and promising them they’d have the last laugh.

“ ‘Come the end of September, “ Proctor recalled him saying, “ ‘we’re going to laugh when we look back at the start of the season and go man, what were we worried about?’ ”

That manager, of course, was Joe Torre, now Proctor’s skipper with the Dodgers. So with the Dodgers off to the same start as the Yankees after 22 games, Proctor figured the same philosophy should apply.

“It’s only April,” he said Friday, before the Dodgers fought the Colorado Rockies through 11 innings, tied 7-7 at press time.

“Nobody ever wants to start off slow. Just take it one day at a time . . . then forget about that and move to the next day. It’s a simple process. And whether you’re 20 games under .500 or 20 games over, it can turn real quick.”

Simple -- and effective -- for the Yankees, who overcame losing records in April to reach the playoffs two of the last three seasons. But the Dodgers may have more than lost games to worry about after a game they had to finish without center fielder Andruw Jones, who sustained a contusion after fouling a ball off his left calf in the fourth inning, and third baseman Nomar Garciaparra, who strained his left calf lunging for Scott Podsednik’s ninth-inning double.

Neither injury is expected to be serious.

But with the Dodgers already short of infielders, Garciaparra’s absence meant catcher Russell Martin had to finish up at third. That marked his big league debut at the position, ending a bizarre night in which he reached base six times with four hits and two walks, raising his average 40 points to .276.

And it proved crucial since the Rockies tied the score when closer Takashi Saito’s first pitch to backup catcher Gary Bennett got through to the screen for a passed ball, allowing Willy Taveras to score an unearned run that sent the game to extra innings.

That miscue also wiped out the remnants of a 7-5 lead the Dodgers had built by sending 18 men to the plate in the third and fourth innings combined, scoring six of them. Martin, who has reached base 18 times in his last 24 plate appearances, singled in each inning while Juan Pierre -- who matched a career high with three walks -- and Andre Ethier both reached base twice in the rallies. And the Dodgers could have had more since they left the bases loaded in both innings.

The Rockies, meanwhile, refused to fold, pounding Hiroki Kuroda for five runs and nine hits in six innings in the worst outing of the rookie’s short big league career. Kuroda may have been affected by the rhythm of the game -- after a 14-pitch first inning, the teams needed 104 to get through the next two.

And things would get stranger after that since Kuroda left with a two-run lead his bullpen couldn’t hold, with Saito giving up a walk, the double to Podsednik -- one of four Rockies with at least two hits -- and the run-scoring passed ball before he got an out, blowing a save for the second time in four chances.

“It’s a little bit frustrating,” said Rafael Furcal, one of the few Dodgers who has played consistently well this year, said of the team’s inconsistency. “[But] it’s a long season. The whole year will not be like that.”

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kevin.baxter@latimes.com