KNOCKOUT PUNCH DODGERS' BATS PICK UP TIRED PEREZ IN VICTORY DODGERS 7, MILWAUKEE 3.

Byline: Tony Jackson  Staff Writer

MILWAUKEE - For six scintillating innings Monday night, Odalis Perez flirted with history. For the next two innings, as a worn-out Perez looked on in sheer agony from the corner of the dugout, the Dodgers bullpen flirted with disaster.

But in the end, Perez got a rare lift from a most unlikely source, that being the Dodgers' formerly punchless offense. The Dodgers, meanwhile, got a 7-3 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers in front of 11,728 at Miller Park.

Perez carried a no-hitter through six innings while facing the minimum 18 batters, but then abruptly ran out of gas in the seventh and left a three-run lead in the hands of the bullpen.

But with reliever Duaner Sanchez on the brink of escaping the inning with that three-run lead intact, the Brewers' Chris Magruder pulled a hard- hit-but-playable groundball up the first-base line that went right through the legs of the Dodgers' Norihiro Nakamura.

It then skipped past rookie Jason Repko in right field and rolled into the corner. Two runs scored on the play, which ultimately was ruled a double and an error on Repko.

An in-house television feed immediately showed Perez screaming in frustration, not so much at his defensively challenged teammates as at the official scorer, who had just charged him with an earned run Perez believed he didn't deserve.

Nakamura had moved across the diamond from third base at the start of the inning as part of what was supposed to be a defensive maneuver by manager Jim Tracy.

But in the eighth, with the Dodgers clinging to a 4-3 lead, Kelly Wunsch came on to face Lyle Overbay with two on and two outs and got Overbay to pop up to medium-depth center, ending the inning. By the time the Brewers came to bat in the ninth, the game would be out of reach.

For much of the past two seasons, Perez took the mound every fifth day knowing that he wouldn't get much run support, knowing that he had to be nearly perfect to have any shot at winning and knowing that on many days, even that wouldn't be enough.

This time, though, the top of the order came through, just as it had all evening.

Facing veteran reliever Ricky Bottalico, Cesar Izturis led off the ninth with an opposite-field single to left. Repko followed with a single up the middle. The switch-hitting Milton Bradley then swatted his second home run of the night, putting the game out of reach and making Bradley the first Dodgers player to homer from both sides of the plate in the same game since Eddie Murray did it twice in 1990.

Izturis, Repko and Bradley, the first three hitters in the Dodgers' lineup, combined to go 8 for 14 with a double, three home runs and six RBI.

The Dodgers now have scored a total of 21 runs in Perez's three starts, each of which has resulted in the veteran left-hander being credited with a win. And the Dodgers, who have struggled for years to put runs on the board, are suddenly averaging 6.67 of them per game. They won their sixth consecutive game and stretched the best record in the majors to 10-2.

This is a very different Dodgers club. Especially where Perez is concerned.

``It is,'' he said. ``If somebody doesn't do the job today, you know somebody else will. That's what this team is all about. This team does a great job of putting the ball in play and scoring runs when we need them.''

Still, not everything was warm and fuzzy for Perez, whose 2.04 ERA would be half a run lower had Nakamura been charged with an error on Magruder's ball.

``I was mad because ... there should have been two errors on that play,'' Perez said.

``That scorekeeper doesn't know what he is doing. I heard they gave (Magruder) a double because he hit the ball hard, but you have to be (kidding) me with that.''

Tracy agreed that Nakamura should have made the play.

``That ball wasn't hit that well,'' he said.

``It shouldn't have been a hit. I have seen those balls corralled before. That ball wasn't corralled.''

Nakamura redeemed himself on the next play, digging Jose Valentin's throw out of the dirt on Wes Helms' ground ball to end the inning, stranding Magruder on third with the tying run.

Repko and Bradley hit back-to-back homers off Chris Capuano (0-1) in the third inning.

Tony Jackson,[phone]

tony.jackson(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

3 photos, 6 boxes

Photo:

(1 -- color) The Dodgers' Milton Bradley, right, is greeted at home plate by Cesar Izturis, left, and Jason Repko after his ninth-inning home run on Monday.

(2) Odalis Perez had a no-hitter for six innings Monday before tiring in the seventh inning, but he improved to 3-0 for the season.

Morry Gash/Associated Press

(3 -- color) no caption (Odalis Perez)

Box:

(1) DODGERS at MILWAUKEE

- Tony Jackson

(2) STORY LINES

(3) PERFECT PEREZ

(4) GAME RECAP

(5) HOW THE RUNS SCORED

(6) ALMANAC