FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- Chan Ho Park continued to make a strong push for the final spot in the Dodgers' rotation Monday, pitching three perfect innings in a 7-4 Grapefruit League win over the Baltimore Orioles.
That gave Park, invited to camp as a nonroster player, seven scoreless innings in three spring outings in which he has given up only two hits and two walks.
"I don't compete against anybody. I just compete against the hitters," Park said. "Yes, my goal is to try to make the team. But not in the game. In the game, you've got to get the hitters out. So I try to focus on that.
"I just go one pitch at a time."
With Brad Penny, Derek Lowe, Chad Billingsley and Hiroki Kuroda set at the top of the rotation, Park is locked in a tight battle with right-handers Esteban Loaiza (who has given up three runs and six hits in seven innings) and Jason Johnson (six innings, three hits, an unearned run) for the slot Jason Schmidt eventually will take when he returns from shoulder surgery.
"He certainly hasn't done anything to hurt his chances," Manager Joe Torre said of Park. "He couldn't be much better than that."
Rookie Chin-lung Hu, making his second consecutive start at second base, had two hits, stole a base and scored once, and Andruw Jones had a two-run homer in the eighth to key the offense for the Dodgers, who have won three in a row.
On to Beijing
Park's next outing will come Saturday in the first of two exhibition games with the San Diego Padres in Beijing. The Dodgers, who will take a team made up largely of minor leaguers on the seven-day trip that begins today, tweaked their China roster slightly Monday by opting to leave aching veterans Nomar Garciaparra and Mark Sweeney in Florida.
Garciaparra's left hand is still swollen after being hit by a pitch Friday and Sweeney has a sore left knee. Minor leaguer Kevin Howard will take Sweeney's spot; no replacement for Garciaparra has been named.
Injury update
Takashi Saito tested his strained right calf in a 23-pitch bullpen session in Vero Beach, finishing free of pain or tightness.
Torre said Saito would pitch to live batters in the next couple of days. "Good news for us, good news for him," Torre said.
But Saito, 38, said he remained unsure if he would be ready for opening day because he wasn't sure how his calf would hold up to the workload required to get him ready for the season.
