Dodgers Check the Breaks

With the score tied and the bases loaded, Jason Phillips struck out to end the ninth inning Saturday, and the luckless Dodgers went on to another gut-wrenching ...

Check that.

Phillips didn’t swing, first base umpire Adam Dowdy ruled.

Given a startling reprieve, the Dodger catcher singled to score Oscar Robles for a 5-4 victory over the San Francisco Giants that set off the kind of celebration among the announced crowd of 48,490 that hadn’t been seen at Dodger Stadium since April 12, the only other time the Dodgers have come back in the ninth to win at home.

Less pleased were the Giants. They went after Dowdy so vociferously that post-game ejections were issued to Manager Felipe Alou and three players: Moises Alou, Yorvit Torrealba and Deivi Cruz.

“That’s kind of weak,” Moises Alou said. “[Dowdy] should have gotten kicked out. That was a [bad] call and it cost us the game.”

Dowdy and second-base umpire Rob Drake are minor league umpires substituting for regular crew members Rick Reed and Ted Barrett.

“I didn’t even recognize him,” Alou said of Dowdy. “I guess he was intimidated because of the big series and the home crowd. To lose like that is unfair.”

Acting crew chief Terry Craft stood by the call and said the four Giants ejected might face a fine.

“We looked at the tape and [Dowdy] got the play right,” Craft said. “Check swings are tough. The camera angle is better than the one we have from first base.”

The Dodgers, who ended a six-game losing streak, didn’t say the call was correct. They did say they were due for a break.

“That’s something that hasn’t come our way,” Manager Jim Tracy said.

Said Phillips: “Maybe the worm has turned for the Dodgers.”

Giant closer Tyler Walker retired the first two batters in the ninth then walked pinch-hitter Olmedo Saenz. Robles singled to center and Cesar Izturis doubled off the first-base bag, scoring pinch-runner Chin-Feng Chen with the tying run.

Had the ball not glanced off the bag, it probably would have rolled into the right-field corner, enabling Robles to score too. Izturis was just glad the ball didn’t end up in someone’s glove; he came to the plate with seven hits in his last 90 at-bats.

“I was happy because I hit it good,” he said. “Then when they walked [Jeff Kent] and Phillips came through, I was really happy.”

Phillips, who began the season batting eighth, has hit cleanup recently because of injuries. He is second on the team and third among major league catchers with 41 runs batted in despite batting .241.

He was amazed his ground ball eluded diving second baseman Ray Durham.

“It found a hole,” Phillips said. “Durham could have had it. It could have hit Kent. But it found a hole.”

The victory kept the Dodgers (41-50) in third place in the National League West Division ahead of the Giants (39-51), who after winning the first two games of the four-games series were saying they might be back in the race.

The Giants scored two runs in the second inning against Odalis Perez, but the Dodgers answered. Hee-Seop Choi led off the second with a double and scored on Jason Repko’s single.

With two out and none on in the third, Choi was hit by a pitch and consecutive singles by Mike Edwards, Jayson Werth and Repko produced two runs and a 3-2 lead. The Giants took issue with that call too, saying replays showed Choi wasn’t hit.

The Giants scored in the fourth and sixth against Perez, then Dodger relievers Giovanni Carrara and Steve Schmoll (2-0) set them down in order the last three innings.