Padres’ Whitson Impressive Again, but Loses Again

SAN DIEGO â€”  Ed Whitson nervously worked the tooth pick through his mouth, back and forth, back and forth. It was late, he had just spent another couple of hours with this summer’s demons, and he was asked if he wanted to talk about it.

“Nope,� Whitson said, shaking his head.

He paused, rubbing his eyes. “But I will.�

The season of confusion continued for the oldest Padre pitcher Thursday as he lost, 2-1, to the Cincinnati Reds. It stopped the Padres’ six-game winning streak but kept alive whatever it is that has hexed Whitson.

Throughout this, one of the longest of his 10 years in the big leagues, 34-year-old Whitson has kept thinking he has seen it all. In front of a paid crowd of 11,836 at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium Thursday, that thinking was again proved wrong.

In six innings, he made one bad pitch, and it wasn’t even to home plate. It was to first baseman Keith Moreland on a sixth-inning, one-out grounder back to the mound by Kal Daniels.

Whitson fielded it, spun, and threw it in the dirt. Moreland tried to scoop, but the ball rolled off the tip of his glove and Daniels was safe.

Three pitches later, Eric Davis doubled to left, Daniels scored, the Reds led, 2-0, and that was that.

In Whitson’s latest two defeats, he has been beaten, 1-0 and 2-1. And before that, six different times, he left a game with the lead in the seventh inning or later and the Padres lost.

“It’s always tough when you lose a game like this,� Whitson said. “It’s just that I’ve lost a heckuva lot of games like this.

“I guess, you’ve got to read between the box scores, or whatever you call them.�

That, and watch the videotape. Thursday evening ended on another appropriate note, with the Padres down, 2-1, in the ninth, and leadoff-hitting Roberto Alomar blooping a John Franco curveball into the right-field gap.

Center fielder Eric Davis ran for it, but his legs have been bothering him. Right fielder Paul O’Neill ran for it, but his legs have never been that great anyway. The ball was falling, falling . . . falling right into the glove of a sliding-on-his-rear O’Neill, who held his prize high as he skidded across the grass.

At the time of the catch, Alomar was rounding second. He would have surely ended up on third. The next two batters, Tony Gwynn and Carmelo Martinez, each grounded out. Alomar’s ball falls, and the game is tied.

“I thought that was going to be a triple, easy, and then who knows what happens,� Alomar said. “I was surprised, because they were so far from the ball.�

He wasn’t the only one who was surprised.

“I forgot Eric had a bad leg and wasn’t running like he usually does,� O’Neill said. “I looked over and saw him and thought, if anybody is going to catch it, it’s going to have to be me. I’m just happy it went into my glove.�

And back to 2 1/2 games ahead of the fourth-place Padres go these third-place Reds, leaving town for Los Angeles while the lowly Atlanta Braves arrive in San Diego today for the start of a three-game weekend series. Never will the Padres get as good a chance to start another six-game winning streak.

“We’re not finished yet, by any means,� said Whitson, who despite a 12-9 record and a 3.75 ERA must fight feelings that his season has been finished several times.

On Thursday, he retired the first three Red hitters, and they then scored their first run in the second on a walk, a grounder, and two singles, the final an RBI looper up the middle by Ron Oester. While the Padres were struggling against Reds starter Jose Rijo, not hitting a ball out of the infield until Garry Templeton’s sixth-inning single, Whitson held the Reds to just one more hit from the third inning until Davis’s sixth-inning double.

That hit didn’t bother Whitson so much--�I got it up, but if I get it in, he might put it 40 rows up, so it wasn’t too bad of a mistake,� he said.

What bothered him was the wild pitch to Moreland.

“I’m not going to say it was my fault, I’m not going to say it was his fault . . . OK, yeah, the throw was low, it was my fault,� said Whitson, who was given the error. “It was a bad throw.�

Moreland said he has scooped balls like that before, but in such a close game, he was worried about missing it altogether and allowing Daniels to end up on second.

“I should have picked it, but there were a lot of things going on in my mind,� Moreland said. “I’ve got to stay in front of that ball and not let it get by me, so I couldn’t really swipe at the ball like you’ve got to if you’re going to make that play.�

Rijo, recovering from tendinitis, was lifted after six innings as a precaution. Two innings later, against reliever Frank Williams, the Padres put together a couple of singles (Benito Santiago, Templeton) and then a run on Randy Ready’s grounder. But by then Franco, the National League’s premier reliever, had entered the game. He has only blown a save opportunity once this year, and he didn’t blow a second here, retiring John Kruk to end the eighth with Ready on first, then putting the Padres down in the ninth for his league-leading 32nd save.

And leaving Whitson with another ache.

“Tell you what, Ed Whitson is the best pitcher on the Padres--the rest are good, but he is awesome,� Santiago said. “I figure, something good has to happen to him sooner or later. At least, that’s what I figure.�

Padre Notes

The Padres have made their first unofficial contact with a representative for one of their free agents. Jerry Kapstein, agent for pitcher Andy Hawkins, visited San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium Thursday, speaking briefly but unofficially with manager Jack McKeon outside the Padre clubhouse around 3:45 p.m. “I’m just here as a friend--I’m still waiting to hear directly from Chub Feeney (club president),� Kapstein said. “And I have been waiting to hear from Chub Feeney for quite some time.� Every day the Padres delay in signing Hawkins is a day that costs them money, particularly with the way he has pitched lately. Hawkins could be one of baseball’s top free agent pitcher if he remains unsigned and tests the market this winter. . . .