PHOENIX - Having toppled Curt Schilling one day earlier, the Orioles had a seventh-inning lead against Randy Johnson last night, which was a bit like seeing an upstart fighter put Joe Frazier against the ropes one day after dropping Muhammad Ali.

With Orioles starter Rodrigo Lopez pitching at the top of his game and Johnson running out of steam, the game reached a climax in the seventh inning, when both teams loaded the bases with no outs.

Johnson escaped from his jam unscathed; Lopez and Orioles reliever Willis Roberts did not.

The Arizona Diamondbacks scored five runs in that fateful inning and held on for a 5-1 victory before 35,215 at Bank One Ballpark.

The Orioles left for San Francisco feeling the sting of dropping two of three games against Arizona and the satisfaction of having battled Schilling and Johnson, the two National League West gunslingers, to a draw.

"We can play with people," said Orioles manager Mike Hargrove. "We're not a contender, but we compete, and people have to show up to beat us. That can't be said of a lot of clubs. Very rarely do we beat ourselves."

In some respects that happened yesterday, as the Orioles walked home both the tying and go-ahead runs. But the Orioles couldn't help but point to two borderline calls that went Arizona's way.

The Orioles arrived at the seventh inning with a 1-0 lead that came when Melvin Mora led off the game with a home run off Johnson, who struck out 11.

In Wednesday night's 6-1 victory, Mora set the tone for the Orioles, blistering a first-inning single off Schilling and scoring on Tony Batista's two-run homer.

This time, Mora turned on an 0-2 fastball from Johnson for his first career leadoff home run.

But Johnson (11-2) shut down the Orioles through the seventh, and then Arizona loaded the bases with singles by Damian Miller, Mark Grace and Tony Womack. With a 2-2 count to Alex Cintron, Lopez threw a fastball that appeared to catch the inside corner of the plate.

Home plate umpire Paul Emmel called it a ball, making it a full count. Lopez fired another fastball, and Cintron checked his swing, but third base umpire Tim Timmons ruled that Cintron did not go all the way around. So it was ball four, and that tied the game 1-1.

"You try to do the job, but what can I say?" said Lopez, who fell to 6-3. "Everybody saw where the [2-2] ball was. You can't complain about that."

Said Hargrove: "We felt like we had Cintron struck out and didn't get the call. The check swing, from where I was sitting, it looked like he swung. I don't know. The fastball the umpire said was off the plate was not, it came back onto the plate, He just gave up on it. And it was a costly pitch."

At that point, it was Johnson's turn to hit, but Arizona manager Bob Brenly went with left-handed pinch hitter Erubiel Durazo. After Durazo, the Diamondbacks were due to send three left-handed hitters and a switch-hitter to the plate.

Hargrove had the right-handed Roberts warming with left-hander B.J. Ryan. He decided to save left-handed bullpen ace Buddy Groom, and turned to Roberts.

"We just felt like B.J. wasn't ready to face that right now after the last couple outings he's had," Hargrove said. "We felt Willis had enough stuff to get us out of that jam."

And as for not using Groom, Hargrove said, "The seventh inning is not Buddy's job. Then you're going to say, 'If you don't use him, and you never get to him, then why the heck have him?' We talked about it, thought about it, it was just too early.

"We can't go to Buddy all the time, or Buddy's not going to be good for us at all."

Durazo battled Roberts to a full count, and then Roberts missed with a slider for ball four. It was the fifth time in Roberts' past 11 appearances he had come into a game and walked the first batter he faced. This time, it gave the Diamondbacks a 2-1 lead.

Then the flood gates opened, as Craig Counsell hit a sacrifice fly, Quinton McCracken hit a run-scoring single, and Luis Gonzalez added another sacrifice fly.

The Orioles couldn't help but point to their own half of the seventh, when they loaded the bases, only to see Counsell make a great play on a ground ball by Brook Fordyce. Counsell ranged to his left and fired home for the forceout. Then Lopez grounded into an inning-ending double play.

"We got our opportunities," said Fordyce, who struck out with runners on first and second in the second inning. "It would have been nice to get a run there."

Orioles tonight

Opponent:San Francisco Giants

Site:Pacific Bell Park, San Francisco

Time:10:35

TV/Radio:Comcast SportsNet/WBAL (1090 AM)

Starters:Orioles' Scott Erickson (3-6, 4.88) vs. Giants' Kirk Rueter (7-5, 3.26)