Major League Baseball

Manny a non-factor as Dodgers win

Published Aug. 21, 2010 1:00 a.m. ET

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Ryan Theriot, Andre Ethier, Jay Gibbons and Matt Kemp all homered in a span of just five batters against Cincinnati's Johnny Cueto in his first start after serving a seven-game suspension, and the Los Angeles Dodgers snapped the Reds' seven-game winning streak with an 8-5 victory Saturday night in Manny Ramirez's long-awaited return to the lineup.

Chad Billingsley (10-7) allowed three runs and seven hits over 5 2-3 innings and struck out seven. The Dodgers had homered only four times in the right-hander's previous nine starts combined, and totaled just eight runs over his previous six outings - including consecutive 2-0 wins over the Giants and Padres.

Jonathan Broxton, the fourth Dodgers pitcher, worked a perfect ninth for his 22nd save in 27 chances. It was the All-Star right-hander's first save opportunity since Aug. 12, when he blew a 9-6 lead in the ninth inning of a 10-9 lead at Philadelphia and was temporarily removed from the closer's role by manager Joe Torre until he worked out his difficulties.

Ramirez, coming off his third stint on the disabled list and second because of a right calf strain, was 0 for 3 with two strikeouts and left the game after five innings with the Dodgers leading 7-1. The 12-time All-Star has missed 59 games this season due to injuries, after sitting out a 50-game drug suspension last year.

The enigmatic slugger, who said at the start of spring training that this would be his final season with the Dodgers, is in the final year of a two-year contract and becomes a free agent at season's end at age 38. Ramirez is 14th on the career home run list with 554, nine shy of Reggie Jackson's total.

Pitching on 10 days rest, Cueto's rustiness was obvious in his first start since an 11-3 loss to St. Louis on in which he was ejected at the end of a bench-clearing melee for kicking several Cardinals players while he was pinned against the home plate screen. The shellshocked right-hander lasted only three innings, allowing five runs and five hits.

Cueto (11-4) walked three straight batters with two out in the first. The third one to Casey Blake forced in Andre Ethier. In the second, Theriot drove an 0-2 pitch into the former ''Mannywood'' seats down in the left field corner for his second homer of the season and Ethier followed with his 19th to dead-center.

The Dodgers, who had recorded back-to-back homers only one previous time this season, turned the trick for the second straight inning when Gibbons' leadoff drive to center struck the top of the center field fence before bouncing over, and Kemp sent his team-high 20th homer into the left field pavilion.

This was the first time the Dodgers hit back-to-back homers twice in the same game since June 29, 1996 at Colorado.

Reds heralded rookie Mike Leake, whose role was changed to long man out of the bullpen after going 8-4 with a 3.78 ERA in 22 starts, relieved Cueto and gave up an RBI double to Blake and a run-scoring single by Jamey Carroll that increased the Dodgers' lead to 7-1 in the fifth.

It was the first relief appearance in the big leagues for Leake, who leads all NL rookies with 138 innings. The right-hander gave up two runs and five hits over 2 1-3 innings and struck out four.

NOTES: With Ramirez's return, the Dodgers used their 94th different starting lineup. It was his first game since the acquisition of 2B Ryan Theriot in the trade that brought LHP Ted Lilly from the Chicago Cubs on July 31. ... OF Scott Podsednik was not in the Dodgers' starting lineup for the first time since he was acquired from Kansas City on July 28 for a pair of minor league prospects.