By Bill Zack
Morris News Service
Web-posted July 18, 1996

HOUSTON - The way the Atlanta Braves see it, playing in the Astrodome is the next best thing to being home.

Actually, it's a little bit better.

Kicking off the longest road trip in Atlanta history Thursday night, the Braves made themselves comfortable in their favorite stadium.

John Smoltz made it a memorable evening with a career-best 16th win and Fred McGriff blasted his 21st home run, as the Braves took a sixth straight victory 3-2 over the Houston Astros before a paid crowd of 35,822 fans.

There's no better place for the Braves to open a 17-game trip then the Astrodome. Since losing all nine games here in 1990, they have an .811 winning percentage, having won 30 of 37 games.

Smoltz (16-4) retired the first 11 hitters he faced and worked into the ninth inning before retiring. Mark Wohlers came on and got the final two outs for his 21st save.

Tied 2-2 in the eighth, McGriff launched a monstrous home run against reliever Todd Jones (6-3) into the upper deck in right field to give the Braves the final lead.

The Braves have seen plenty of Astros left-hander Mike Hampton in the past 10 weeks. He shut them out on three hits in the Astrodome May 1, then dropped a 4-2 decision in Atlanta July 6.

A loser of his last two starts, Hampton fell behind 1-0 in the third inning when the Braves executed the game's fundamentals perfectly. Rafael Belliard caught the Astros' defense by surprise with a two-strike bunt, then Smoltz pushed him along with a sacrifice bunt. Finally, Marquis Grissom scored Belliard with a single, just his second hit in his last 10 at-bats.

Fundamentals were lacking the next inning on Fred McGriff's part. He led with a double, then inexplicably failed to advance when Javier Lopez hit the ball to the right side, a failure that cost the Braves a run.

Jermaine Dye followed with a single, but McGriff was stopped at third, then Ryan Klesko went down swinging in a second straight at-bat and Belliard's grounder ended the threat.

Hampton made a mistake with a curveball in the fifth and he paid a high price. Grissom drove it into the left field stands for his 14th homer, matching the second-best total of his career, and upping the lead to 2-0.

The Braves missed another opportunity to push a run across the plate in the sixth when Dye singled and was thrown out stealing. Klesko followed with a single and Belliard lined another base hit into right field, a flurry of offense that was wasted when Smoltz grounded into a fielder's choice.

Hampton hung tough, yielding 10 hits, but only a pair of runs in six innings, and his perseverance paid off when the Astros broke through with a run against Smoltz in the sixth.

Rick Wilkins' one-out double was just the second hit against Smoltz and Craig Biggio's two-out double cut Atlanta's lead in half. Following a walk to Jeff Bagwell, Smoltz got a grounder from Derek Bell to end the inning.

The Astros were right back at it the next inning. Sean Berry doubled and Wilkins' one-out sacrifice fly scored him with the tying run.