SEANEZ CAN'T HOLD ON RELIEVER BOMBED IN SIXTH INNING.

Byline: TONY JACKSON 

Staff Writer

HOUSTON -- Rudy Seanez already had faced six batters, during which time he had blown a two-run lead, allowing two inherited runners to score, walked twobatters and recorded only twoouts, one of which was a gift on a ball bunted right back to him.

If all that didn't confirm for the veteran Dodgers reliever that this wasn't going to be his night, the man standing at the plate with the bases loaded certainly should have.

That man was Houston's Craig Biggio. And it had already been established, hours earlier in fact, that this night unquestionably belonged to him.

But just to drive home the point -- as well as the threerunners on base plus himself -- Biggio sent Seanez's next pitch on a rope into that ridiculously contrived section of seats that juts out into left field at Minute Maid Park.

From the moment it left his bat, it was clear the grand slam, the fourth of Biggio's decorated and probably Hall of Fame career, would be the decisive blow in a game the Dodgers were never going to win anyway.

The inevitable result was that the Dodgers fell 7-4 to the Astros in front of 38,247 on Tuesday night. For Biggio, it was the perfect ending to a day that began with him announcing his retirement, effective at the end of the season.

For Seanez, who had received a visit from Dodgers pitching coach Rick Honeycutt immediately before he threw the fateful pitch -- "I told him to throw it and see how far they could hit it," Honeycutt later joked -- it was one more episode in what has become a recurring longball nightmare, the fifth home run Seanez has given up in his past 4 2/3 innings.

"I wish I knew (why)," Honeycutt said. "Our (bullpen) has obviously been worked hard, but you still have to deal with what you have when you go out there. You still have to make quality pitches. I think (fatigue) has more of an effect on the inexperienced guys. The experienced guy knows himself better and knows the hitters more."

Seanez, 38, is as experienced as they come, but it didn't help. Pitching for the fifth time in eight days, he came on in relief of Mark Hendrickson, who had given the Dodgers five solid innings before giving up hits to the first two batters in the sixth.

Seanez then immediately gave up a score-tying double to Morgan Ensberg, walked Jason Lane on four pitches, threw out Ensberg at third on a bad bunt by Eric Bruntlett and got Eric Munson to pop up.

And then, with a 2-2 count on pinch hitter Mike Lamb, Seanez missed with his next two pitches, setting the stage for Biggio's grand moment.

Seanez (6-2), usually one of the Dodgers' most media-friendly players, left the clubhouse without talking to reporters.

"He was well-rested," Dodgers manager Grady Little said of Seanez. "He made a couple of good pitches to Ensberg and hung one for the double. It kind of fell apart after that."

The Dodgers saw their lead over second-place San Diego shrink to one game in the National League West. But Little said there were reasons for this defeat that had nothing to do with Seanez, starting with the fact the Dodgers made outs on five consecutive pitches in the third and fourth innings against Jason Jennings (2-6).

"We got a little bit out of character in the middle part of the game," Little said. "The thing that has made us very successful these past few weeks, which is being patient at the plate and seeing a few pitches, we got away from that. We need to go back out there (tonight) and see if we can (correct that)."

The Dodgers did a better job of working counts late in the game, but they stranded four baserunners in the final three innings, three of them in scoring position.

On an eighth-inning swing, Dodgers catcher Russell Martin felt a recurrence of some lower back pain that has recently bothered him. Martin doubled in a run on the next pitch, took third on a groundout, was stranded there when the inning ended, then left the game.

"As a catcher, you're not going to feel 100 percent every time you go out there," Martin said. "This is definitely not an injury."

Martin also said the pain had nothing to do with his ongoing slump, during which he is 5 for 33 since sitting out the July 17 game against Philadelphia.

"That would just be an excuse," he said. "I don't really make excuses."

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TUESDAY

Houston 7

Dodgers 4

TODAY

Dodgers (Lowe 8-9) at Houston (Albers 2-4), 5:05p.m., Minute Maid Park.

TV: Ch. 9

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1 -- color) Dodgers reliever Rudy Seanez gave up a grand slam to Craig Biggio in the sixth inning.

(2) Houston's Craig Biggio celebrates as he runs the bases after hitting a grand slam in the sixth inning.

David J. Phillip/Associated Press