Braves Not Done Winning, Dealing : Baseball: They waste a 5-0 lead but come back to beat Houston in 13th. Atlanta also gets Bielecki and Berryhill from Cubs.

By DAN HAFNER

Sept. 30, 1991 12 AM PT

Nobody ever told the Atlanta Braves that their pursuit of the pennant in the National League West would be easy.

They completed a sweep of their three-game series at Houston on Sunday when Brian Hunter doubled home Ron Gant from first base in the 13th inning to beat the Astros, 6-5. They remained one game behind when the Dodgers rallied to beat San Francisco.

The Braves, making every effort to win their first division title since 1982, then acquired pitcher Mike Bielecki and catcher Damon Berryhill from the Chicago Cubs for two minor league pitchers.

In the first two games of the series, the Braves, most of whom are in their first pennant battle, had to come from behind to win.

In this one, they were breezing behind 21-year-old Steve Avery, 5-0, going into the bottom of the seventh.

The Astros scored in the seventh, then chased Avery during a four-run eighth that sent the game into extra innings.

Another recent acquisition, Jim Clancy (3-5), pitched three shutout innings of relief to win it.

The Astros had runners on second and third with two out in the 13th, but Andujar Cedeno popped out to end the game.

The game was a switch for the Braves, who have come from behind to win 34 times this season.

They had not scored since the seventh inning when Gant opened the 13th with a walk against Mark Portugal (10-11) and scored on Hunter’s line drive down the left-field line. Hunter was a late-inning replacement for Sid Bream at first base.

The Astros, disappointed in Portugal as a starter, are trying him as a late-inning reliever. The experiment was a disaster in this series. He appeared in a key spot in each game and flopped each time.

It was the Braves’ first sweep at the Astrodome since 1985, and sent Houston to its fifth consecutive loss.

“You don’t expect wild games in this dome,” Manager Bobby Cox said. “But we got an outstanding job from Clancy and Hunter crashed the big hit. When you get up by five and then get tied, it’s hard to take.”

Hunter, who stranded runners in his first two at-bats, said, “It felt great to get the hit today after leaving those runners. We know somebody will pick us up.”

Bielecki, 13-11 for the Cubs, and Berryhill, a promising catcher until he suffered a shoulder injury in 1990, will join the Braves tonight when they open a three-game series at Cincinnati.

“I’m not happy, I’m shocked,” Bielecki said in St. Louis, where the Cubs beat the Cardinals, 5-3.

Bielecki said he thought he might be traded at the All-Star break, “but I didn’t think I’d be traded with six days left.”

Said Berryhill, who is batting .189: “I’m ready to catch. I know Greg Olson has had to catch every game, and I can give him a rest.”

The new Cubs, Turk Wendell and Yorkis Perez, are considered top prospects.