BASEBALL

Many of the veteran Dodgers from 1994 not only will have to find work elsewhere when the strike ends, several may find themselves out of the game.

Third baseman Tim Wallach is one of the fortunate ones.

Wallach signed a contract three months ago that will cut his base salary by $1.8 million, but because of the strike’s devastating effect on the marketplace, he’s grateful to have a job upon his return.

“There’s going to be a lot of good players who find themselves out of work,” Wallach said, “and I think it’s going to take the game down a little bit. Nobody’s happy right now, but I’m glad when this thing is settled I don’t have to find a job.”

The Dodgers already have bid farewell to such veterans as Orel Hershiser, Jim Gott, Roger McDowell and Cory Snyder. If Wallach hadn’t signed his deal for $1.5 million with $675,000 in incentives, he wonders if he might have been in that group.

“Nobody wants to take a $1.8-million cut off his salary, but we had to look at the whole picture,” said Alan Meersand, Wallach’s agent.

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Pitcher Tom McCarthy, the Dodgers’ scheduled opening day starter, said that his wife narrowly escaped serious injury last weekend when she was involved in a head-on automobile accident.

Jane McCarthy was driving the family Volkswagen in Lexington, N.C., when she crashed head-on at about 45 m.p.h. She suffered a cracked sternum, broken kneecap and now is experiencing whiplash pains, McCarthy said.