Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Dodgers being careful with Gagne

MLB SNAPSHOT

The Astros start their only series of the season in Denver tonight before heading to St. Louis. The Cardinals were swept out of Houston over the weekend, when a Jim Edmonds slump hit 1-for-20 depths.

Take out three wins in a row from two weeks ago, and Texas is riding the misery of a 2-17 stretch. It finished its past three seasons 20 1/2, 43 and 31 games out of first place in the AL West.

Monday, the Rangers beat Seattle to improve to 66-84. But they remained 24 1/2 games behind Oakland, which defeated Anaheim. At least Alex Rodriguez is closing in on his third AL home run title in a row, right Texas fans?

Lee has set career marks this season with 30 homers and 21 stolen bases. Unlike his father Leon and uncle Leron, Derrek, 28, has not been forced to spend any time honing his skills in Japan.

Houston, however, might benefit most from Milwaukee's turn, since the Astros play host to the Brew Crew in their last four regular-season games.

Dodgers manager Jim Tracy, who always looks as if he's worried that he left his keys inside the locked Volvo out in the parking lot, is wising up about the abilities of some of his stars.

He has been reluctant to overuse star closer Eric Gagne, who always wants the ball, anyway. That's a fine line, and Tracy chose against using Gagne last week in a tight situation in Phoenix.

Instead, Tracy tabbed Paul Quantrill, who gave up a three-run homer to pinch-hitter Steve Finley with two outs in the eighth inning, clinching a 5-4 victory for Arizona.

Sunday, with a runner on second and two outs in the eighth inning of a 5-2 game against San Diego, Tracy called for Gagne. He hit a batter, then closed out that inning and the ninth to get his 51st save.

Gagne, 27, just keeps impressing with his ever-expanding repertoire. He wears prescription goggles to protect an old hockey eye injury, and nearly gave up baseball while recovering from elbow surgery in 1997.

He would have accepted a hockey scholarship to play for the University of Vermont. Instead, this free-agent-to-be, who's making $550,000 this season, stuck with baseball and is set to secure his financial future this winter. He might even need to clear some space in his trophy room, too.

Of the 84 Cy Young Awards that have been doled out since 1956, eight have been won by relievers. That three of those eight did not close on playoff teams should offer solace to Gagne, if the Dodgers miss the postseason.

The first went to Mike Marshall of the Dodgers in 1974. The most recent in the NL went to Mark Davis, who saved 44 for San Diego in '89. The last in the AL went to Dennis Eckersley, who rang up 51 for Oakland in '92.

Gagne is bearing down on the NL record of 55, set by John Smoltz of Atlanta last season, and the single-season standard of 57 that Bobby Thigpen recorded for the White Sox in 1990.

Smoltz, who won a Cy Young as a starter for the Braves in '96, might be the one NL pitcher who will challenge Gagne for the award.

Although Smoltz is on the shelf because of an elbow injury, he was instrumental in helping Atlanta race away from the rest of the NL East. He owns 44 saves, with a 0.89 ERA.

Gagne has a 1.30 ERA, and has struck out 129 in 76 innings. Foes hit .128 against him.

Just running down the break-away Florida Marlins, the wild-card leaders by 1 1/2 games, will be challenging for the Dodgers. Even Philadelphia is a game ahead of Los Angeles in that race.

The Dodgers, however, have many reasons to be optimistic about their future, with a farm system that is producing long-awaited dividends and a weekend sweep of their pesky rivals.

A week after Tracy publicly applauded Koyie Hill, Joe Thurston and Steve Colyer, youngsters who had been influential in a victory, players who have been at the lower levels of the organization this season continued to help the parent club.

Sunday, catcher David Ross, who started the season at Triple-A Las Vegas, belted two homers in the Dodgers' 5-2 victory against San Diego.

Wilson Alvarez, who sharpened his stuff for a month with the 51s, threw a complete-game, four-hit shutout against the Padres on Friday. He walked one and struck out seven to improve to 5-1.

Edwin Jackson, summoned from Double-A Jacksonville about 10 days ago, gives Tracy a sterling option in his rotation, or did anyone miss his scintillating major-league debut last week in Phoenix?

Jackson allowed four hits over six innings against Randy Johnson of the Diamondbacks and in the Dodgers' 4-1 victory.

In his second year as the team's farm director, Bill Bavasi said the contributions of the diaper Dodgers proves that the franchise has made strides in its player development.

"You recognize when you've got a special guy and advance him more quickly," Bavasi told MLB.com about Jackson. "Our goal is to put them at a minor-league level where they must deal with adversity, instead of facing it for the first time at the major-league level."

Actually, those fretful Mets went 40-120-1.

At this point of the season 41 years ago, the Mets had won only two of their previous 17 games. Included in that spell was a 7-7 tie in Houston against the Colt .45s, on a 90-degree day in which only 3,630 fans paid to sit in Colt Stadium.

The Mets scored a run in the seventh inning to tie it, 7-7. Then the game was halted by curfew after eight innings because, in those days, no inning could start after 7 p.m. on Sundays.

After Game No. 149, an 8-2 victory against Cincinnati, the Mets were 37-111-1. Detroit's Game No. 149, a drubbing by Kansas City on Monday, dropped it to 38-111.

Over its past 17, Detroit has won five times. But the rest of its opponents -- Toronto (three games), Minnesota (seven) and Kansas City (three) -- all have winning records.

In '62, the Mets finished 3-9.

Meanwhile, Detroit manager Alan Trammell has yielded to Jeremy Bonderman's request for another start, and Bonderman (6-18) will take to the hill Friday in Minnesota.

Trammell had removed Bonderman from the rotation because of -- guess what -- ineffectiveness. Trammell also did not want the ignominy of a 20-defeat season to sting the 20-year-old pitcher for years.

In Toronto on Sept. 5, Tigers starter Mike Maroth became the game's first 20-game loser in 23 years, since Brian Kingman did the deed. Kingman had clung to that notoriety because it kept his name in the papers, so at least that's over.

If Bonderman falters Friday, odds are that Trammell will not allow him to go for No. 20, anyway.

The last team to have two 20-game losers was the '65 Mets, with Jack Fisher (8-24) and Al Jackson (8-20). Before that, Jackson went 8-20 for New York in '62, when Roger Craig was 10-24.

Soriano hit his 30th homer Monday, becoming the second American Leaguer to register consecutive seasons of 30 home runs and 30 stolen bases (he has 33 bags). Last year, as a rookie, he had 39 homers and 41 steals.

Bobby Bonds (with California in 1977, and Texas and the Chicago White Sox in '78) is the other member of the elite AL 30-30 club. In the NL, Willie Mays ('56-57), Ron Gant ('90-91), Barry Bonds ('95-97) and Vladimir Guerrero ('01-02) have pulled off the feat.

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