Cardinals’ Bottenfield Gets Ninth Victory

Kent Bottenfield is tied for the National League lead with nine victories, and he owes it all to Detroit. Specifically, he owes it to Tiger pitching coach Rick Adair.

“Rick Adair is the reason I’m still in baseball,” Bottenfield said after pitching six strong innings in the St. Louis Cardinals’ 7-2 victory over the Tigers on Saturday night at Detroit.

Bottenfield (9-2), who gave up two runs and five hits with seven strikeouts against the Tigers, had been knocking around the big leagues for three years when he signed with Detroit as a minor league free agent in 1995.

He spent that season with the Tigers’ triple-A farm club at Toledo, where Adair was the pitching coach.

“He spent an incredible amount of time working with me,” Bottenfield said. “He changed my delivery. He taught me how to study hitters and make adjustments. He was the best thing that ever happened to me in the game of baseball.”

As fate would have it, Bottenfield is tied with Houston’s Jose Lima for the NL lead in wins. Lima also spent his formative years working with Adair in the Detroit system.

Boston’s Pedro Martinez leads the majors with 11 victories.

Eli Marrero drove in two runs and Fernando Tatis extended his hitting streak to a career-high 11 games for the Cardinals, who broke a three-game losing streak.

Juan Encarnacion hit a two-run homer for Detroit, but the Cardinals broke the game open with four runs in the seventh.

Mark McGwire, who had gone hitless in his first seven at-bats in the series, singled and later scored.

Baltimore 7, Philadelphia 6--The largest crowd to watch a regular-season game at Baltimore’s Camden Yards was treated to an assortment of late-inning heroics, the last of which was provided by Mike Bordick.

Bordick singled in the winning run with two out in the bottom of the 10th inning to give the Orioles the victory.

The hit delighted the majority of the 48,531 fans, many of whom jeered the Orioles after their bullpen blew a two-run lead in the ninth.

Atlanta 6, Boston 5--Greg Maddux won for the first time in more than a month because Tom Gordon blew his first regular-season save in more than a year.

Javier Lopez’s two-run double in the ninth inning at Boston gave the Braves the victory.

Rookie Brian Daubach’s second run-scoring single of the game had given Boston a 5-4 lead in the eighth and Maddux (5-3) appeared to be on his way to his fourth consecutive loss since April 29.

Then Gordon retired the first two batters in the ninth before faltering. Singles by Chipper Jones and Brian Jordan put runners at first and third. Otis Nixon then ran for Jordan and stole second.

Lopez followed with a hard grounder just inside the third-base line for the winning hit and Gordon’s first blown save in the regular season since April 14, 1998.

Montreal 5, Toronto 0--Miguel Batista pitched a three-hitter for his first career shutout and Orlando Merced hit a three-run homer as the Expos defeated the Blue Jays at Toronto.

Batista (5-2), who won for the first time on the road, gave up singles to Dave Hollins in the first inning, Jacob Brumfield in the third and Tony Fernandez in the sixth.

Batista struck out six and walked five in his second career complete game.

Chicago White Sox 6, Pittsburgh 5--Magglio Ordonez had three hits, including the go-ahead RBI single, to lead the White Sox at Chicago, ending the Pirates’ seven-game winning streak.

Ray Durham hit a game-tying homer and Chris Singleton drove in two runs for the White Sox.,

Jim Parque (6-5) broke a personal three-game losing streak. He gave up five runs--one earned--on seven hits and three walks over 6 2/3 innings. Parque matched his career strikeout high with seven.

Florida 9, Tampa Bay 7--The Marlins tied a team record, scoring eight times in the sixth inning, to come from behind to beat the Devil Rays at St. Petersburg.

The victory gave the Marlins their first four-game winning streak since last July and improved their major league-best interleague record to 22-11, including a 5-1 mark against their intrastate rivals.

Jorge Fabregas highlighted the big inning with a two-run triple against Mike Duvall (0-1) that put Florida ahead, 5-4. Mike Lowell had an RBI double and Cliff Floyd, Bruce Aven, Luis Castillo, Alex Gonzalez added RBI singles.

Brian Meadows (5-5) gave up five runs on eight hits in 5 1/3 innings.

Houston 6, Minnesota 5--Richard Hidalgo homered and drove in four runs and third baseman Bill Spiers made two key defensive plays for the Astros at Minneapolis.

Hidalgo, who tied a career high with four RBIs, went three for four and drove in the go-ahead run with a double in the eighth as Houston improved to 4-4 on its season-long 12-game trip.

Cincinnati 9-7, Kansas City 4-4--Barry Larkin’s three-run homer in the 10th inning at Kansas City carried the Reds to a sweep of the Royals in the first interleague doubleheader.

Larkin connected against Jeff Montgomery (0-3) as the Reds won their seventh consecutive game, all on the road. It is their longest road winning streak in 13 years. The reeling Royals suffered their seventh consecutive loss.

Montgomery started the 10th and gave up back-to-back singles to Greg Vaughn and Sean Casey, who was five for 10 with two home runs and five RBIs in the two games. Casey and Jeffrey Hammonds homered twice and drove in every Cincinnati run as the Reds won the opener.

San Diego 3, Seattle 2--Eric Owens’ bases-loaded single with one out in the 10th inning lifted the Padres at San Diego.

Loser Jose Mesa (0-1), who worked two-thirds of an inning, loaded the bases with one out on a single by Ed Giovanola and consecutive walks to Mike Darr and Damian Jackson. Owens’ hit to right field scored Giovanola.