National League Roundup : Wild Throw Gives Giants 7-6 Win Over Astros in 11

There’s a certain feeling in the San Francisco Giants’ dugout these days, and Kevin Mitchell knows it well.

Mitchell’s fourth hit of the game helped score the winning run in the 11th inning Thursday as the Giants beat the Houston Astros, 7-6, at San Francisco to remain tied for the NL West lead with the Cincinnati Reds.

“This is just like it was with the New York Mets last year,” said Mitchell, who was traded to the San Diego Padres by last year’s champions before this season and came to the Giants in another deal later.

“Everything is going good for us right now.”

The victory was the seventh in eight games for the Giants. The defending NL West champion Astros lost for the sixth time in seven games and fell four games out of first.

Robby Thompson doubled with one out in the 11th and scored on a two-out throwing error by Houston shortstop Buddy Biancalana, who went to his right to field Mitchell’s grounder that was ruled a hit.

“I swung at a sinker and just chopped the ball on the ground,” Mitchell said. “It’s a good thing I got it in the hole and that he made a bad throw. I thought I had the throw beat.”

Biancalana’s error made a winner of Giant reliever Craig Lefferts (3-4) and a loser of Rocky Childress (0-1).

It was the fourth misplay of the game for the Astros.

“It came down to another routine play,” Houston Manager Hal Lanier said. “If we’d made the routine plays, we would have won the game in nine innings.”

Astro pinch-hitter Davey Lopes tied the score at 6-6 in the top of the ninth with a one-out RBI single.

Mitchell had hit a three-run homer off reliever Larry Andersen with two out in the seventh inning to give the Giants a 6-5 lead.

Mitchell’s 15th homer of the season came after Houston infielders made two misplays in the seventh. Mitchell was the first batter to face Andersen, who was attempting to save a victory for Nolan Ryan.

Ryan, who has not won since June 12, pitched four-hit ball and struck out 10 over 6 innings.

Craig Reynolds, Billy Hatcher and Glenn Davis hit home runs off Giant starter Mike Krukow. Hatcher’s ninth homer, a two-run drive in the sixth, gave Houston a 4-3 lead.

Chicago 7, New York 5--The Cubs found themselves trailing by five runs after two innings at Chicago but rallied against Dwight Gooden and Roger McDowell to beat the Mets on Jody Davis’ two-run, tie-breaking single in the eighth inning.

Frank DiPino (2-2) got the victory in relief, and Lee Smith got the final out of the game for his 29th save even though he allowed the Mets to load the bases in the ninth

Tim Teufel hit a two-run homer off in the first inning off Mike Mason and the Mets added three runs in the second on a run-scoring double by Keith Hernandez, Kevin McReynolds’ sacrifice fly and Gary Carter’s run-scoring single.

The Cubs scored three times in the third, two runs coming on Dave Martinez’s seventh homer, and tied the score in the fifth on run-scoring singles by Leon Durham and Ryne Sandberg.

San Diego 5, Atlanta 3--Chris Brown hit a three-run double to tie the score in the sixth inning and scored the winning run on Garry Templeton’s single as the Padres rallied at San Diego to make the Braves their eighth victim in nine games.

Atlanta’s David Palmer (6-10) blanked the Padres on four hits for five innings and took a 3-0 lead into the sixth before Brown and Templeton connected. Randy Ready doubled to score Templeton with the final run.

Mark Grant (3-6), who was out of the game after pitching six innings, was the beneficiary. Lance McCullers pitched the last two innings for his 12th save.

Montreal 9, Pittsburgh 7--Tim Wallach drove in five runs, and Tim Raines equaled his club record by scoring five times as the Expos downed the Pirates at Montreal.

Raines also hit his 15th homer and stole his 500th career base.

Wallach tripled home Raines in the first inning to start the Expos back from a 5-0 deficit, hit a three-run homer and drove in a run with a ground out in the eighth to take over the NL lead with 99 runs batted in.

Pittsburgh’s Barry Bonds led off the game with his 17th homer to ignite a five-run outburst in the first inning.