FINCHES SURVIVE A.J.'S "PIERCING"

Las Vegas----In the city that never sleeps, the Darwin Finches survived a third-inning salami by A.J. Pierzynski, scoring five times in the middle innings then turning things over to their sensational bullpen to retake the lead in the Atlantic Series, two games to one. Kelvim Escobar (15-6, 3.53 in the regular season) was nursing a 2-1 lead going into that fateful inning against A.J. Burnett, but it wasn’t all his fault. Iguchi and Holliday singled with two out, and Manny Ramirez’s hot shot to third was mishandled by Chipper Jones, loading the bases. Prince Fielder hit a soft single just over the leaping Mike Jacobs to score the tying run, and that brought up Pierzynski, who drilled a line drive over the outstretched glove of Jeff Francouer in right, a GRAND SLAM!

Had all the momentum swung Vegas’s way? The series was tied, and they were now leading 6-2 with two down in the bottom of the third in a pivotal Game Three. If Darwin was going to avoid going down in the series and possibly losing the playoff to the underdog, they would need to get going immediately....

Which they did. Berkman led off the fourth with a solid single against Burnett, and Jacobs and Carlos Guillen each would collect RBI doubles in the inning, the second knocking Burnett out of the game. Chuck James came on to retire Placido Polanco, preserving a 6-5 Vegas lead, but the Unnatural Selections had come right back to make a game of it. Escobar, meanwhile, put up zeroes for two frames after his disastrous third, and in the fifth his teammates gave him the lead he sought, scoring twice against James and Aaron Heilman, the big blow being an RBI triple by Francouer to score Berkman, who had walked.

And that was it: Darwin had a 7-6 lead, and used its pen liberally to ensure that Escobar (1-0, 9.00) would get the win. Yovanni Gallardo worked for the second time in the playoffs, with the rookie retiring seven hitters. Tom Glavine pitched to one batter (Fielder) and got a weak grounder, Jonathan Broxton got two hitters, and Trevor Hoffman finished up for the first save in the playoffs, and it appeared as if Darwin had reached a turning point.
"We are very bad (unprintable)," said DH David Ortiz to the revved-up Darwin locker room. "We expect to (unmentionable) people up, and I don’t give a (anatomically impossible) who knows it." Less obscenely, it was noted that Darwin now led 2-1 and needed only to win one of the next two games to head to the Series.