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  Thursday, Sep. 7 7:40pm ET
Maddux, Braves sweep sinking D-Backs
 
  RECAP | BOX SCORE | GAME LOG

ATLANTA (AP) -- This was the Greg Maddux of the early and mid-1990s. The guy who won four straight Cy Youngs with impeccable control and great movement on his pitches. The guy who breezed through games with a modicum of time and effort.

Curt Schilling
Curt Schilling was 3-0 with two shutouts in four previous starts against Atlanta. He lost his fourth straight start Thursday.

Maddux pitched a four-hitter and helped out at the plate with a two-run double as the Atlanta Braves completed a three-game sweep of the Arizona Diamondbacks with a 4-0 victory Thursday night.

"He was unhittable," manager Bobby Cox said. "The way his ball was moving and (with) his off-speed stuff, he was in complete control. Nothing but strikes."

Maddux (16-8) was perfect through 4 2-3 innings, finally having to work from the stretch when shortstop Rafael Furcal bobbled a grounder by Matt Williams and threw the ball away for an error.

Danny Bautista followed with the first hit, a single up the middle, but Maddux retired Kelly Stinnett on a fly to center. Bautista had two of Arizona's hits, also singling in the eighth.

Maddux was so good that even a shaky infield defense didn't faze him. After Bautista's second hit, David Dellucci followed with an easy double-play grounder that was botched by second baseman Keith Lockhart for another error.

Schilling vs. Maddux:
Past five head-to-head starts
  Schilling Maddux
Wins
4
1
ERA
1.80
1.00
Earned runs
8
4
Innings
40
36
Strikeouts
42
25

But Tony Womack followed with a two-hopper to Furcal, who stepped on second and threw on to first for the inning-ending double play.

"That was about as good as I've seen him pitch," said Arizona's Greg Colbrunn, who had hit safely in 17 of his last 18 games but went 0-for-4 against Maddux. "It was his stuff and his location. He put them both together. His movement, too."

Maddux gave up five first-inning runs in each of his last two starts _ something that had not occurred in 10 years. This time, he needed only seven pitches to get through the first, retiring the side on three grounders.

"I was trying to make sure I kept that monkey out of my head," he said. "It wasn't that much difference really. I threw a couple down the middle and they hit them at the shortstop instead of bouncing them to the left fielder."

The first inning set the tone. Maddux got 18 groundouts and an infield pop, struck out six and didn't walk anyone. He allowed only two flies to reach the outfield in pitching his fifth complete game and second shutout of the year.

Maddux threw only 90 pitches, 70 for strikes. The game lasted only 2 hours, 20 minutes.

Arizona manager Buck Showalter left Turner Field shortly before the first pitch to attend to a family matter in Florida. It wasn't known when he'll rejoin the team, and coach Carlos Tosca filled in as acting manager.

The Braves, whose sweep came after a stretch in which they lost eight of 11 games, stretched their lead in the NL East to 2½ games over idle New York. Arizona has lost 11 of 15 and dropped 5½ games behind the Mets in the NL wild-card chase.

"If any other club had been out there, it would have been the same," Tosca said. "I think the Yankees would have had trouble hitting (Maddux) tonight. It looked like he was on a mission."

Curt Schilling (10-11) couldn't stop this slide, even though he was facing a team he had dominated this season.

Schilling, who lost his fourth straight start, surrendered seven hits and all four runs in six innings. He was 3-0 with two shutouts in four previous starts against Atlanta.

"I had a chance to get out of every situation," he said. "I'm just not performing. I'm just not doing my job."

The Braves broke it open with a three-run fourth, all of the RBI generated by the bottom of the batting order with two outs. Eighth-place hitter Paul Bako singled to right, driving in Wally Joyner, and Maddux worked the count to 3-2 with two runners on base.

Schilling grooved a fastball and his counterpart sent a liner over Bautista's head in right field, clearing the bases.

The Braves went ahead 1-0 in the first with a two-out rally. Chipper Jones walked, B.J. Surhoff singled and Joyner lined a hit up the middle for the RBI.

"It was frustrating," Schilling said. "The bottom line is that every run scored with two outs."

Game notes
With his 30th career shutout, Maddux passed Whitey Ford on the victory list. Maddux is 237-134, while Ford was 236-106. ... Surhoff left the game with a pulled right quadriceps after running out his single in the first. He probably will miss several games, Cox said. George Lombard, a late-season callup, played the rest of the game in left. ... Diamondbacks second baseman Jay Bell was ejected by first-base umpire Eric Cooper in the sixth after appearing to beat out a grounder between shortstop and third. Furcal fielded the ball and made a strong throw from the hole, but TV replays showed Bell's foot was on the bag when the ball arrived. Cooper called him out, Bell argued and was thrown out.

 


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AUDIO/VIDEO
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 Greg Maddux got off to a good start in his complete-game shutout.
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 Bobby Cox and the Braves felt they were due for a victory over Curt Schilling.
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