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Ethier's homer caps comeback as Dodgers top Pirates

Jun 3, 2007 - 11:25 PM PITTSBURGH (Ticker) -- Andre Ethier hit a go-ahead homer in the eighth inning as the Los Angeles Dodgers scored five unanswered runs to beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 5-4, in the third game of a four-game series Sunday.

The victory was dampened when closer Takashi Saito left the contest in the ninth inning with an injury to his left hamstring.

The Pirates jumped on Dodgers starter Brad Penny early and looked on their way to beating the seven-game winner for the third time in six career decisions. Adam LaRoche homered to right in the first inning and delivered a run-scoring single in the second.

Pirates starter Tom Gorzelanny brought home a run in the third with a groundout and Jason Bay provided the Bucs a 4-0 lead with his 10th homer in the fifth.

"It was one of those days where not too many things were going right (early), and we had to go and plug away there," Ethier said. "We kept plugging along, tried to get things done and they turned in our favor at the end."

Penny lasted six innings, surrendering four runs - the second most in 12 starts this season - and nine hits. It also was the second-most hits Penny had permitted in 2007, and he had not allowed a home run yet this season until Sunday.

"When you cam minimize the damage like he did, that's all you can ask for," said Dodgers manager Grady Little, who was ejected for arguing a play at the plate in the fourth inning. "You keep pitching, keep those one-run innings up and you'll get a chance to overcome those. But we can't overcome too many crooked-numbered innings early in the game."

Penny, who has been ill for the past week and taking medication, vomited in the dugout before taking the mound but did not blame his sickness for the sub-par performance.

"The pitches they hit were bad pitches," Penny said. "Being sick had nothing to do with it. It was a nice game to win. The guys came back, and that's huge."

Los Angeles finally got to Gorzelanny in the seventh. Jeff Kent drove in a run with a groundout, Rafael Furcal singled in another and Nomar Garciaparra brought the Dodgers within 4-3 when he legged out a base hit against Salomon Torres (0-2).

The Dodgers then took the lead when the displaced closer yielded a two-run homer to Ethier in the eighth.

"I was just looking for a pitch out over the plate to drive the other way and get (Russell Martin) to second base any way possible," Ethier said. "You never go up there thinking to do something like that but sometimes when you don't try to do something, you get the best result."

Torres lost his closer's job to Matt Capps after allowing two ninth-inning runs and blowing his fourth save in 16 chances Thursday against San Diego.

Chad Billingsley (4-0) pitched the seventh for the win, Jonathan Broxton logged the eighth. After Saito allowed a one-out single and then left the contest, lefthander Joe Beimel entered and retired the last two hitters for his first save.

Gorzelanny, who had yielded just eight runs over his last six starts, carried a three-hitter into the seventh. The 24-year-old lefthander entered with a 2.44 earned run average in his last 19 starts, dating to the 2006 season.

"This one's tough," Pittsburgh manager Jim Tracy said. "We made a couple bad pitches late in the game.

"If you go back and look at the game, we had four consecutive innings of just one run as opposed to getting a big inning somewhere. You can't let a good club like this hang around."

Saito experienced tightness in his hamstring while pitching to Jose Bautista and removed himself from the game. Little said he would be re-evaluated Monday.

"We don't know how serious it is but we felt like he informed us in time," Little said.