DODGERS HIT BUMP ON ROAD BAD INNING SPELLS DOOM FOR WEAVER SAN DIEGO 8, DODGERS 3.

Byline: Tony Jackson  Staff Writer

SAN DIEGO - Six days after a triumphant homecoming in which he threw seven spectacular innings, Jeff Weaver threw a colossally bad one Tuesday night. By the time it finally ended, Weaver was a distant memory, and so was any hope of a Dodgers victory in their 2004 road debut.

The San Diego Padres scratched out six runs in the fourth inning, all charged to Weaver, and cruised from there to an 8-3 victory over the Dodgers in front of 35,156 at Petco Park.

For three innings, Weaver continued the career renaissance that began last Wednesday night at Dodger Stadium, when the Simi Valley High School alum pitched well enough against the Padres in his Dodgers debut to get a win but received only enough run support to get a no decision.

This time, there still wasn't much run support. And this time, there wasn't much in Weaver's tank, either, at least not in the fourth inning.

After sailing through the first three innings, Weaver began the fourth by issuing a five-pitch walk to Padres second baseman Mark Loretta. He then gave up five consecutive singles, finally got two outs, then gave up another run-scoring single before manager Jim Tracy mercifully came to get him with the Dodgers trailing 6-1.

``Obviously, you don't want to walk the first guy in the inning,'' Weaver said. ``That was kind of a wrench in the whole thing. But I think it was more a matter of I simply didn't make the in-inning adjustments. It was pretty obvious that either they were sitting on off-speed stuff or I was showing something in my stretch that they recognized as off- speed.''

The Dodgers (4-3) lost their second consecutive game, falling a half- game behind San Francisco in the National League West and into a second-place tie with the Padres.

``The game boiled down to that fourth inning,'' Tracy said. ``I don't think he threw the ball that badly. He had some pitcher's counts. But he left a number of breaking balls in the zone with two strikes, and most of those were hit for base hits. You have to be cognizant of how the offensive players are reacting to your sequence of pitches. If you find that you need to make adjustments midstream, you have to make them.''

Admittedly, Weaver (0-1) has a career-long pattern of not making them quickly enough.

``But at the same time, even when you feel like they know what's coming, you still feel like if you make quality pitches, you can get them out,'' Weaver said. ``Maybe I didn't do a good job of recognizing. Obviously, the first couple of innings went smoothly, and I felt like I had a good rhythm and could throw strikes wherever I wanted to. But you have to recognize, when they all of a sudden start putting hits together after they weren't early on, that it's time to go back to your strength.''

The Dodgers hitters, who have now scored a total of two runs in Weaver's two starts while he was still in the game, didn't help much either. Just as he did in Weaver's previous start, Padres right-hander Adam Eaton (1-0) gave the Dodgers hitters fits. This time, he held them to two runs on six hits over seven innings before turning it over to former Dodgers right-hander Ismael Valdez, who pitched the final two.

On a positive note, first baseman Shawn Green finally seemed to emerge from his early-season slump with a leadoff single in the second and his second home run of the season in the seventh. Meanwhile, catcher Paul Lo Duca continued his season-long tear, going 2 for 3 to raise his average to .538.

But it was nevertheless a frustrating evening for Lo Duca. After all, he was the guy trying to catch Weaver's pitches. In the fourth inning, too many of them never got that far.

Tony Jackson,[phone]

tony.jackson(at)dailynews.com

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