CHICAGO (AP) – Edgar Renteria hit two of the Atlanta Braves’ club-record eight homers in a 13-12 victory in 11 innings over the Chicago Cubs on Sunday.

Marcus Giles hit a three-run homer and Adam LaRoche homered twice for the Braves. Atlanta also got solo shots from Andruw Jones, Ryan Langerhans and Brayan Pena to complete the three-game sweep of the Cubs, who have lost 21 of their last 25 games, including six straight.

The eight home runs by the Braves broke a club record set on Aug. 3, 1967, against the Cubs in Milwaukee. Chicago also set a club record for giving up the most home runs in one game. The Cubs broke the old record of seven, most recently set on Sept. 9, 2000 against Houston.

Pena set the club’s franchise record in the seventh inning. He hit his first career homer leading off the inning against Cubs reliever Roberto Novoa making it 12-8.

After blowing a four-run lead in the ninth, the Braves scored in the 11th when Langerhans hit a routine pop-fly that Cubs’ third baseman Aramis Ramirez couldn’t catch. Langerhans reached second on the error. After a groundout advanced him to third Giles followed with a single.

Scott Eyre (0-1) took the loss for the Cubs.

Oscar Villarreal (7-0) pitched a scoreless 10th inning and Ken Ray pitched the 11th for his second save in three chances.

The Braves bullpen couldn’t hold a 12-8 lead in the ninth, Todd Walker led off with a single to left off Lance Cormier. One out later, Jones singled to right, chasing Cormier. Ronny Cedeno followed with a pinch-hit double off of Chris Reitsma, cutting the lead to 12-9. Neifi Perez followed with a two-run triple off the wall in right. Freddie Bynum tied the game at 12 with a slow bouncer that Reitsma picked up and threw home to Pena, who wasn’t able to put the tag on Perez.

It was Reitsma’s fourth blown save of the season.

Braves starter John Smoltz gave up eight runs and 10 hits in six innings.

Chicago pitcher Jae Kuk Ryu, making his first major league start was overmatched by the Braves lineup. He gave up four home runs to the first 10 batters he faced and was chased after working only 1 1-3 innings.

Notes: Womack made his first start of the season for the Cubs. … Smoltz came up lame after covering first base in the second inning. He stayed in the game after he threw several warmup tosses. … Jeff Francoeur threw out Michael Barrett at the plate from right on a fly in the second inning. Barrett was trying to score from second on Ramirez’s single. Todd Pratt, who put the tag on Barrett left the game after the inning and was replaced by Pena. … Smoltz broke his errorless streak at 162 games with an error in the sixth inning.

AP-ES-05-28-06 1823EDT


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