Angels Fall in 10th as Rains and Baines Add Up to a 3-2 Loss

Because of rain-slickened grounds at Comiskey Park, the Angels couldn’t run when they had to run Friday night. And because of Manager Gene Mauch’s play-a-hunch strategy, they didn’t walk when they had to walk.

When it’s the bottom of the 10th inning, the winning run is on third base and Harold Baines is at the plate, the book dictates: Send Baines four wide ones, get him out of the way and set up the double play.

Mauch, however, said pitch to him.

So rookie Chuck Finley sent a fastball Baines’ way. Baines, the White Sox’s leader in home runs and runs batted in, drove the ball over the heads of drawn-in Angel outfielders Devon White and Ruppert Jones, scoring Daryl Boston and giving Chicago a 3-2 victory.

In the grand scheme of the American League West race, it didn’t matter much. Because Texas lost, 4-2, at Minnesota, the Angels’ first-place lead remained nine games, and their magic number dropped to 14.

But it still represented opportunities wasted for the Angels in a game they let slip away twice--on the basepaths in regulation play and at the plate in the bottom of the 10th.

“We won the game in nine innings; we just couldn’t carry it through,” Mauch said. “(The White Sox) won it in 10 innings . . . so to speak.”

Mauch was alluding to the Angels’ adventures in the mud during the seventh inning, when Bobby Grich slipped rounding second and Darrell Miller slipped rounding third--both potential go-ahead runs becoming official outs.

The Angels also lost Wally Joyner to the sloppy track when he slipped while running to first base on an infield out in the third inning. Joyner landed hard on his left shoulder, bruising the rotator cuff and leading to his exit from the game four innings later.

He had the shoulder examined after the game and is listed on a day-to-day basis.

There is no black cloud following the Angels from city to city, but the rainstorm that ruined the Angels’ footwork in Chicago was part of the same system that washed out Thursday night’s game in Cleveland.

“It took a long time for that storm to get us,” Mauch said.

Miller tied the game at 2-2 when, batting for Joyner, he singled home George Hendrick from second base with Grich on first. Grich tried to take the extra base but stumbled as he headed for third and was thrown out easily by center fielder Boston.

“I know I would’ve made it easy if I don’t lose my footing,” Grich said.

After Grich was out, Miller took second on a single by White and headed for home when Bob Boone also singled up the middle. Miller made a wide turn on the grass around third and wound up on the ground. By the time he scurried to his feet, he was caught in a rundown.

“I got a good angle around third,” Miller said, “but the grass slopes off right there. It was really damp, my foot hit a little muddy part, and I slipped right off the slope.”

The game then remained at 2-2 as Angel starter Don Sutton gave way to Gary Lucas, who gave way to Vern Ruhle.

In the 10th inning, Ruhle gave way to Finley, who walked the first batter he faced, Boston. Steve Lyons sacrificed. That brought up Baines, who had doubled and singled in his previous four at-bats, with one out and first base open.

Mauch disdained the intentional walk and had Finley pitch to Baines. Finley’s first offering was a fastball that sailed up, in and away from catcher Boone for a wild pitch that enabled Boston to advance to third.

Finley then delivered a strike and, finally, the game-loser, making his record 2-1. Center fielder White and right fielder Jones were playing shallow, trying to cut off any line drives, but Baines put the ball where neither outfielder had a chance.

The ball short-hopped the wall, and the Angels’ four-game winning streak was over.

Mauch’s strategy was not without precedent. During the Angels’ 14-inning victory over the Indians Wednesday night, he had Donnie Moore pitch to Julio Franco and Joe Carter with first base open in the ninth inning. Moore got two infield outs and sent that game into overtime.

“It was the same principle as the other night,” said Mauch, who had explained that he didn’t want Moore, at less than peak form, putting an extra runner on base and putting more pressure on the pitcher to throw strikes. Same with Finley.

“If he’s really sharp, he doesn’t walk the leadoff man. I wish it had been against someone of lesser caliber than Harold Baines, but when you have the winning run on third base in extra innings on the road, you’re in a lot of trouble anyway.

“We got out of it the other night but not tonight.”

Boone described Mauch’s decision as “a tough call. But it’s not my call. He got away with it the other night. He’s gotten away with a lot this year. But if (Finley) makes another pitch to Baines like the one before (a strike), maybe we get out of it. That’s why a manager’s job is not all that fun at times.”

Boone, who has aspirations of someday joining Mauch’s managerial fraternity, was asked if he’d play it differently.

He paused. He smiled.

“That’s not for me to answer right now,” Boone said. “That’s for me to answer in a few years.”

Angel Notes

Angel Manager Gene Mauch found himself short in the bullpen because his best right-handed reliver, Donnie Moore, was back in Orange County undergoing examination after complaining of headaches. Friday, Moore flew to Southern California, where doctors found him to be suffereing from a migraine condition. Moore received medication and is expected to be back in Chicago and in uniform for today’s game. . . . Darrell Miller became the answer to a trivia question: Name the first player to pinch-hit for Wally Joyner. Joyner had tried to play with the shoulder he bruised in the third inning but grounded out weakly in the fifth. By the seventh, Mauch decided to make a change and bring on Miller. “I told (Joyner) I didn’t want him up there if he couldn’t put his best swing on the ball,” Mauch said. “He didn’t say anything, but I could tell all was not right.” Said Joyner: “As the game went on, the shoulder got tighter and tighter. Finally, it got to where every time I put my arm up, I had to let go of the bat. The doctors say it’s a contusion of the rotator cuff, but I think it’s a pulled muscle.”

The rain did have some benefits for the Angels. Thursday night’s postponement in Cleveland may have scrambled Mauch’s pitching plans, but the reshuffling helped the Angels in at least two ways. One, it enabled Mauch to start Mike Witt today in place of 0-4 Ray Chadwick, and, two, it gave John Candelaria an extra day’s rest before his next start. Candelaria was originally scheduled to pitch Monday, but that start will go instead to Urbano Lugo. “I’m thinking of holding Candy back until we open at home against Kansas City (Tuesday),” Mauch said. “He can still feel a little tenderness in his arm. And Lugo has pitched well on this mound in the past.” Last season, two of Lugo’s three victories came against Chicago. He beat the White Sox at Comiskey Park, 6-3, and at Anaheim, 3-1. Lugo thus became the fifth name Mauch has plugged into the fifth spot in the Angels’ starting rotation. “We’re working somebody in there all the time,” Mauch said. “All the searching around we’ve done, with (Jim) Slaton, (Ron) Romanick, (Vern) Ruhle, Chadwick. Maybe Lugo will put an end to all that.”

The rainout also gave Brian Downing the day he needed to treat his badly bruised left triceps. Downing was back in the lineup Friday night after having been hit on the elbow by a pitch Wednesday night. He drove in the Angels’ first run with a sacrifice fly. . . . Gary Pettis, who sustained a shoulder injury Wednesday night, took batting practice and played catch in the outfield before the game. Pettis, who had his right shoulder treated with ice packs and an electronic muscle stimulator, admitted surprise at the progress of the injury. “At first, I was concerned about muscles being torn,” he said. “I wasn’t too happy about it (Thursday), but then again, it was just the day after.