Bloop Crew Wins It

And for the Dodgers’ next trick, they will squeeze blood out of a stone.

After wringing four runs from a parched offense that had scored once in the previous 26 innings, after staging an improbable eighth-inning rally with three bloop hits--one that drew chalk off the left-field line--for a 4-3 come-from-behind victory over the Montreal Expos on Thursday night, anything must seem possible to the Dodgers.

A crowd of 21,408 in Dodger Stadium saw Chad Kreuter, a reserve catcher with a .129 average, drop a lawn dart of a two-out RBI single to right field to score Marquis Grissom with the winning run, ending a string of eight games in which the Dodgers scored three runs or fewer.

Left-hander Omar Daal (4-0) struck out three of six batters in the seventh and eighth innings to gain the victory, closer Eric Gagne struck out two of three in the ninth for his 13th save, and third baseman Adrian Beltre, moved from the seventh to second spot in the order, and Grissom, the center fielder, each had three hits.

“That was big,” Daal said of the rally. “We were losing, and you need to get runs any way you can. This was big for the team, the way we scored those runs. We needed this game tonight.”

First baseman Eric Karros ended the Dodgers’ 18-inning scoreless streak with a two-out RBI single in the first inning and also sparked the winning rally in the eighth with a leadoff bloop single to right.

Cesar Izturis, who did not start at shortstop, came on as a pinch-runner. Mark Grudzielanek, whose solo home run had pulled the Dodgers within 3-2 in the sixth, popped to first, but Grissom, fighting off an 0-2 pitch from Expo starter Tomo Ohka, flared a double off the left-field line to score Izturis to make it 3-3.

Hiram Bocachica struck out, and the pitcher’s spot was next. Dodger Manager Jim Tracy used reserve first baseman Dave Hansen as a pinch-hitter in the sixth inning, so he had no choice but to hit Kreuter, a move that would enable Tracy to shift catcher Paul Lo Duca to first and use Kreuter behind the plate.

Montreal Manager Frank Robinson, noting the switch-hitting Kreuter’s .154 average from the left side and .000 mark (0 for 5) from the right side, countered with left-hander Graeme Lloyd. But Kreuter foiled the strategy with his game-winning hit.

“It was fun to get in there in that situation,” Kreuter said. “Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good.”

The Dodgers were neither lucky nor good in their previous two games, managing four hits in shutout losses to the New York Mets, and it was obvious the temperature in their dugout was rising.

“You shouldn’t get to a point where every inning you feel intense pressure,” Grudzielanek said. “You don’t score, and every inning it’s like, ‘Oh my God.’ Before you know it, it’s the sixth or seventh inning, and you’re pressing. Usually, it’s one big inning that triggers [the end of a slump].”

It appeared the Dodgers would produce that inning in the fourth when they loaded the bases with no outs, but Bocachica lined back to the pitcher for a double play and starting pitcher Kevin Brown struck out to end the inning.

They had two on with two out in the fifth, but center fielder Brad Wilkerson made a running catch of Karros’ drive to the gap in left-center to end the inning. They failed to score after Grissom doubled with no outs in the sixth.

After Beltre’s leadoff single in the seventh, Green, who hasn’t hit a ball out of the infield in four games, grounded into his 12th double play of the season, putting him on pace to shatter the franchise record of 27, shared by Carl Furillo (1956) and Karros (1996).

The Expos had taken a 2-0 lead in the first inning when Vladimir Guerrero launched a pitch from Brown an estimated 437 feet.