Unlike much of modern society, baseball still keeps score. Each pitch, play and swing of the bat is meticulously judged and forever recorded.

But nothing counts for sure until the fifth inning. That's when baseball rules provide that even a rainout, earthquake or power failure can't wipe the record clean.

"I'm just a small thread in the tapestry of baseball," says Dan Hartack, tonight's official scorer for the series opener against the struggling Cincinnati Reds. "I consider it an honor."

Clearly it's not about money. Hartack, like his fellow scorers throughout the league, is paid a paltry $100 a game. For that amount, however, they get to contribute to the ongoing history of a sport they love.

There's something oddly solemn about the blue scorer's chair. It's located at the very heart of the stadium, directly in line with home plate, second base, and dead center field. If baseball has a buck, it stops here.

"Once a pitcher had a no-hitter after five innings," recalls Hartack, "and Matt Williams slipped going for a ground ball." To the dismay of the crowd, he called the grounder a hit. Luckily, another batter later rapped a clean single, erasing the possibility that his decision would forever be second-guessed.

In the past, official scorers were drawn from the gaggle of journalists covering the game. Conflicts inevitably emerged. A disgruntled player might threaten to boycott a writer who ruled a tough play an error or refused to credit a batter a borderline hit.

Now major league baseball hires all the scorers and specifically prohibits discourteous conduct towards the scorer. Hartack, a statistician by trade, can't recall a player ever contesting one of his calls. "They make too much money," he laughs. Sometimes a team representative will suggest that a mistake has been made. If the replay bears out the case, Hartack will change his decision.

Scorers have to pass an open book exam before taking the job, but politics as much as baseball knowledge determines who gets hired. Few potential scorers are ever nominated for league consideration without strong home team support. Scorers help shape a baseball team's culture. The best become part of the family.

Terry Johnson, one of three Dodger official scorers, was among the most loved. On the Fourth of July earlier this year, he suffered a heart attack while driving to the stadium for a late afternoon game. Dodger flags flew at half-staff in remembrance. Press box regulars held impromptu eulogies for days after Johnson's untimely demise.

"He was the best," says a woman while she sets up her computer in a corner far removed from the scorer's chair. She feeds play-by-play into an on-line database.

Despite the mountain of information generated by multiple games occurring in several cities each day during the season, baseball has largely resisted the "new" economy's allure. In the go-go years of the digital craze, millions of dollars were spent to create real-time networks for accessing data that no one, in fact, really wanted. Most firms went bankrupt. Those servicing baseball were sold for a pittance back to the league.

"I fill out the record on this sheet of paper," Hartack explains, "and I fax it to the league office." Someone sitting in the row behind him compiles the box score, which he later checks for accuracy. Old economy, hard copy rules. Nothing official is trusted to the Internet.

The Dodgers open play in first place, barely ahead of the Arizona Diamondbacks and their surging arch-rivals, the San Francisco Giants. They have just traded for two relief pitchers to help during the season's stretch run. The Reds come into town a major disappointment, a once proud franchise with a ghastly record. Both teams battle to a 1-1 tie through the ninth inning.

At the start of the game, with a man on third, a Red runner scoots from first to second base without drawing a throw. "Stolen base," Hartack rules. "That's the scorer's decision," muses Dodger announcer Vin Scully, who thinks it could just as easily be called an uncontested fielder's choice.

In baseball, however, the scorer has the last word. After the teams grapple into the 11th inning, Hartack signs the result into history: Reds 3, Dodgers 1.