Padres Bitten by Injury Bug, Giant Homers : Baseball: McGriff sustains ankle injury in the sixth inning of 6-4 loss to San Francisco, spoiling Whitson's return from disabled list.

By BOB NIGHTENGALE

June 30, 1991 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

SAN DIEGO — The Padres were feeling good about themselves again. And who could blame them?

They had Ed Whitson back on the mound Saturday for the first time in a month. Greg Harris was on his way from Las Vegas, rejoining the team and completing their rotation. Hard to believe, but the Padres were on the brink of having a healthy team.

Then along came Saturday, when they were tormented once again by injuries, losing 6-4 to the San Francisco Giants in front of 52,488 at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

“Just when you think you’re getting better,” Padre Manager Greg Riddoch said, “the sniper shows up.”

First baseman Fred McGriff, the Padres’ lone home run threat, sustained a sprained right ankle while running the bases in the sixth inning. Shortstop Tony Fernandez also left the game in the eighth because of the flu.

McGriff’s injury is not believed to be serious. The Padres expect him to return in midweek, possibly as early as Tuesday for the Dodger series. But considering the Padres had 15 hits--their third-highest total of the season--and still lost Saturday, it indicates how vital McGriff is to the offense.

“Hopefully, he’ll be OK,” said second baseman Bip Roberts, who put on a defensive show, saving two runs with his glove. “We need him. When you have 15 hits and hit the ball hard all night, it’s tough to lose games like that.

“But we’re not playing Nintendo here; this is real baseball.”

And the Padres, who for once this season would like to have their roster intact, are finding out that they cannot keep muddling along at .500 if they expect to stay in the National League West race. The fourth-place Padres (38-38) dropped a season-high 7 1/2 games behind the Dodgers, and the fifth-place Giants have closed to within five games of the Padres.

The Padres were delighted to find that at least Whitson is healthy, despite numbers Saturday that were hardly ideal.

Whitson, in his first game back since May 26 when he was diagnosed with tendinitis in his right elbow, pitched five innings, allowing six hits and four earned runs. It wasn’t the kind of performance to which the Padres are accustomed from Whitson, but for his first outing in nearly five weeks, it’s a start.

“I felt great, to tell you the truth,” Whitson said. “I felt like I was on top of my pitches again, and Lord knows how long that’s been. And really, I had the best slider I’ve had all year.”

Really, it was only one pitch that had Whitson mumbling to himself.

Whitson confessed that he was nervous at the outset--”like it’s opening day all over again,” he said. After giving up two first-inning runs, he retired the side in the second on 10 pitches. And in the third, he had two outs, a runner on first, when rookie Mark Leonard stepped to the plate.

After fouling a ball off his ankle, Leonard hit the next pitch--a changeup--into the right-field seats, giving the Giants a 4-0 lead. It was Leonard’s first homer of the season, and the fourth time in the past two weeks the Padres have surrendered a hitter’s inaugural homer of the year.

“I made that one mistake to whatever the hell his name is,” Whitson said. “I never heard of him. I guess I heard of him now.

“The next time I face him, it might be a different story.”

The next time the Padres face the Giants, next weekend in San Francisco, they also are expected to have their rotation intact for the first time this season when they activate Harris, who has been on the disabled list since April 23.

Harris made his final start in his rehabilitative start Friday in Las Vegas, allowing seven hits and four runs in six innings. All of the runs were scored in the sixth inning.

“We’d like to get him one start next week,” Riddoch said, “and then we’ll ravamp the whole (rotation order) over the All-Star break.”

The Padres also might take the time during the break to consult an astrologist or hypnotist or psychologist--anybody who could tell them why all these injuries are occurring.

The latest happened in the sixth inning, after the Padres had cut the Giants’ lead to 4-2. McGriff led off the inning with his second hit of the game, and Jerald Clark followed with a soft liner to center. McGriff went halfway down to second, stopped when he thought the ball might be caught and, when it dropped, turned his ankle as he headed toward second, hopping on his left foot for 40 feet.

McGriff immediately was taken out of the game, and Darrin Jackson brought in as a pinch-runner. Just like that, 15 homers and 50 RBIs were out of the lineup.

That brought up Benito Santiago, who hit a hard bouncer down the third-base line that looked like it might be headed for left field. But Giant third baseman Williams backhanded the ball, and, although his momentum carried him into foul territory, ran back, touched third base and threw to first for the double play. The inning ended when Howard grounded to first.

“Matt is probably the best third baseman in the game,” Roberts said. “He made one hell of a play. That broke our back.”

The Padres, who had at least two baserunners in four of the last five innings, closed to within one run after eight innings, only to watch Robby Thompson and Terry Kennedy hit back-to-back homers in the ninth. The Padres have surrendered 10 home runs in the past five games.

Still, the Padres came back in the ninth, scoring one run, and had runners on first and second with one out. But Jackson flied out to center, and Clark popped up end the game.

“What can you do?” Riddoch said.