MARTIN FEELS RIGHT AT HOME CATCHER HAS KEY HIT IN L.A.'S VICTORY DODGERS 8, TORONTO 4.Byline: TONY JACKSON
Anthony (Antonio) Jackson, best known as Tony Jackson Staff Writer TORONTO -- For all the great things he figures to accomplish over the next decade or so, Russell Martin
The suits in the commissioner's office ended all hope of that a couple of years ago, when they decided his hometown was no longer a suitable locale for a major-league ballclub. But if Martin can't go to Montreal, at least not in his official capacity as a big-league ballplayer, that's OK. Because for the past three days, Montreal came to Martin. A small sample of it, anyway. Playing in front of a busload bus·load n. The number of passengers or the quantity of cargo that a bus can carry. Noun 1. busload - the quantity of cargo or the number of passengers that a bus can carry of family and friends who made the five- hour trek, Martin delivered the biggest of several blows in a six-run, eighth-inning rally that carried the Dodgers to an 8-4 victory over Toronto in front of 25,265 on Thursday night at Rogers Centre
• . With that, the Dodgers had taken two of three from the Blue Jays, giving them their their first interleague series win on the road in almost three years. Martin's hit, a two-run double into the right-field corner off an utterly ineffective Casey Janssen Robert Casey Janssen (born September 17 1981 in Orange, California) is a right-handed relief pitcher in Major League Baseball who currently plays for the Toronto Blue Jays. He was selected by the Blue Jays out of UCLA in the fourth round of the 2004 draft. , turned a 3-2 deficit into a 4-3 lead. It also perfectly capped off Martin's first appearance as a major leaguer in his native Canada. During the three-game series against the Blue Jays he went 3for11 with a double, a home run and four RBIs. "It has been fun," Martin said. "A lot of my family had never seen me play at all, let alone as a professional. So this was an opportunity for me to see them. "I didn't really get to do anything with them off the field, but I saw them after games, chatted with them and signed some autographs. This is the season, and it isn't a vacation for me. That's what I told them." A vacation? Hardly. From the time the Dodgers' charter landed here on Monday evening until the time it took off late Thursday, Martin fielded so many media requests that he had to hold his own news conference before the first game, half of which he conducted in French. He also did a lengthy interview and photo shoot for Sports Illustrated Sports Illustrated is the largest weekly American sports magazine owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. It has over 3 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men, 19% of the adult males in the country. , and met with reporters after every game at his locker. And on Thursday he also found time to nurse pitcher Chad Billingsley Chad Ryan Billingsley (born July 29, 1984, in Defiance, Ohio) is a Major League Baseball right-handed pitcher with the Los Angeles Dodgers. Biography As a senior at Defiance High School in 2003, pitched in 11 games and was 6-1 with a 1. through his first start of the season, an outing that went better than manager Grady Little William Grady Little (born March 30, 1950 in Abilene, Texas) is a manager in Major League Baseball. He guided the Boston Red Sox from 2002 to 2003, and has been manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers since 2006. or pitching coach Rick Honeycutt la·brum n. pl. la·bra A lip-shaped anatomical edge, rim, or structure. labrum pl. , Billingsley milked 74 pitches and almost four innings out of a right arm that wasn't ready to go deep into a game after 23 mostly solid relief appearances. Only in the second inning did Billingsley revert to the same bad habit bad habit Unhealthy habit Clinical medicine A patterned behavior regarded as detrimental to physical or mental health, which is often linked to a lack of self-control. Cf Good habit. -- throwing too many pitches -- that so often derailed him as a rookie starter last year. He walked Gregg Zaun after a spirited, 10-pitch plate appearance, then gave up a two-run homer on his fifth pitch to Aaron Hill. "I wasn't fighting myself," Billingsley said. "I was just missing closely and trying to maybe be too precise too early in the count. That was what Russ came out and told me." Although Billingsley gave up a double later in the inning, he settled down from there. Soothed by whatever Martin said to him, he retired six of the final seven batters he faced before Little cut him off well beyond his pregame limit of 60 pitches. Mark Hendrickson, whom Little wisely held in reserve during Wednesday night's blowout loss, then got the Dodgers through the sixth and into the seventh. Rudy Seanez (4-1) got the next two outs, setting the stage for that eighth-inning rally against Janssen (2-1). When it was over, and the third-place Dodgers had pulled within a half- game of co-leaders San Diego and Arizona in the NL West, Martin packed three days of fond memories into a blue equipment bag, rode the team bus to the airport and boarded a plane back to reality. This might not have been Montreal, but it sure felt like home. "I always tell people I was a couple of years too late," he said. "But I had fun with this. It still hasn't really sunk in, but I'm sure after a couple of weeks I'll look back and realize how great it was to play professionally in Canada. It's something you dream about." tony.jackson@dailynews.com (818) 713-3675 CAPTION(S): photo Photo: (color) Dodgers catcher Russell Martin, right, congratulates closer Takashi Saito after the Dodgers' win Thursday. Adrian Wyld/Associated Press |
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