DODGERS NOTEBOOK: BILLINGSLEY IS IN COMMAND.

Byline: TONY JACKSON 

Staff Writer

PHILADELPHIA -- Dodgers officials always knew Chad Billingsley had a performance like this in him. Several of them, in fact. Perhaps even a career's worth.

Avoiding the high pitch counts that had been his undoing in so many previous starts since he first arrived in the major leagues some 14 months ago, Billingsley dominated the Philadelphia Phillies on Thursday, holding the National League's top scoring team to a run on four hits over seven dominating innings in the Dodgers' 5-2 victory.

Billingsley retired the first sixbatters he faced, gave up a leadoff single to Jayson Werth in the third, then retired the next six batters he faced.

His only hiccup came in the sixth, when he issued a leadoff walk to Shane Victorino that led to the Phillies tying the score 1-1 on Pat Burrell's two-out double. But the Dodgers quickly re-took the lead in the top of the seventh, and Billingsley didn't allow another baserunner.

"My command was there," Billingsley said. "As far as velocity, there really wasn't too much there. But I spotted it up really well, got my off-speed stuff across and got ahead of hitters. I was able to put guys away when I needed to. I had quick innings, and I made them hit my pitch."

The result was that Billingsley got his first win in exactly one month, since the night he came within one out of a complete-game shutout at Houston before giving up a two-run homer to Luke Scott in the ninth inning.

It couldn't have come at a better time for the rebounding Dodgers, who had gotten a similarly stellar outing from Derek Lowe on Tuesday night and managed to take two of three from the potent Phillies, holding them to four runs on 11 hits in those two wins.

Streak ends: Dodgers reliever Jonathan Broxton gave up a solo home run to Tadahito Iguchi with two outs in the eighth, cutting the Dodgers' lead to 5-2. It was the first homer off Broxton in more than a year, ending a streak of 94 games and 96 2/3 innings.

It was the longest such streak by a Dodgers pitcher since the team moved to Los Angeles a half-century ago, but it was only the second-longest active streak in the majors. Oakland's Chad Bradford entered the day having gone 114 games and 97 2/3 innings without giving one up.

"I never thought about it much," Broxton said. "I just went out there and pitched my game. Every streak has to come to an end sometime. I'll just have to start another one. I thought I threw a good pitch. (Iguchi) just popped it up, but this field is kind of short down there, and it just went out."

Iguchi's blast landed about four rows deep just inside the right-field foul pole, 330 feet from home plate.

Pierre OK: Broxton's wasn't the only streak that ended. Center fielder Juan Pierre was thrown out stealing for the first time in 19 attempts, and to add injury to insult, he also jammed his left pinky diving into the bag.

Trainer Stan Conte attended to Pierre, and Pierre stayed in the game.

Pierre had reached base with an RBI single, extending his hitting streak to 11 games.