Ghosts of Seasons Past Visit Angels’ Mauch in Game 5 : Another Big One Is Lost After Manager Admits ‘We Had It Done’ Against Red Sox

Gene Mauch stood in front of the closet in his clubhouse office. He removed a windbreaker from a hanger and dropped it into his equipment bag. The gray traveling uniform of the Angels followed, then a pair of spikes. The manager shook his head and said:

“The last thing in the world I needed was to pack this sucker one extra time.

“It’s hard to beat the Red Sox three in a row anywhere, but we had it done.”

Mauch leaves with the Angels for Boston this morning. The calendar reads Oct. 13, but maybe it’s still September of 1964 or October of 1982. Maybe the demonic timetable will never change.

The ghosts survived again Sunday after Mauch drove them to the precipice.

He needed only one more strike and one more out for a 5-4 victory that would have given the Angels their first American League pennant in the history of the franchise and the first pennant for Mauch in 25 years as a major league manager.

No longer would he carry the cruel label of the best manager who has never won.

No longer--or not as frequently--would he be reminded of:

--1964, when his Phillies failed to hold a 6 1/2-game lead with 12 to play as Mauch was second-guessed for employing a two-man rotation of Chris Short and Jim Bunning.

--1982, when his Angels built a 2-0 lead but failed to win the best-of-five American League playoff with Milwaukee as Mauch was second guessed for (a) starting Tommy John on three days rest, and for (b) later disregarding the availability of left-hander Andy Hassler as Cecil Cooper delivered the game winning hit off right-hander Luis Sanchez.

This was the win that would send Mauch to his first World Series, righting all the wrongs, real and imagined.

Was he thinking about all that when he had that 5-4 lead with two out in the ninth inning Sunday?

“No, I was only wondering what kind of out Donnie Moore would get,” he said.

Moore didn’t get the out. The 5-4 victory evolved into a 7-6 loss in the 11th. The Angels still lead this best-of-seven playoffs, 3 games to 2, but now must play Game 6 on the Red Sox turf.

Instead of the sweet taste of champagne, Mauch again faced the bitter torment of a second guess.

Should he have removed Mike Witt with two outs and a 5-4 lead in the ninth, Witt having led, 5-2, before Don Baylor clubbed a two-run, one-out homer in the ninth, the eighth Boston hit.

Witt got Dwight Evans to pop up but wasn’t allowed to face Rich Gedman, the left-handed hitting catcher who had homered, doubled and singled previously.

The call went to left-hander Gary Lucas, who had struck out Gedman the only two times they had faced each other, one of those Saturday night.

The move backfired when Lucas hit Gedman on the hand with his first pitch, bringing on Moore, who got a 2-and-2 count on Dave Henderson, only to have Henderson foul off two pitches, then hit a two-run homer for a 6-5 Boston lead, reviving the ghosts.

Patient and composed later, Mauch said that Witt would have stayed in had it been any other hitter except Gedman.

“I can handle this, but if I let him pitch to Gedman again and he hangs out another rope, that I couldn’t handle,” Mauch said.

“I had seen Gedman take enough hacks off Witt for one day, and I had never seen Gedman do anything but strike out against Lucas. I mean, if Lucas lost him, he wasn’t going to lose him big, and then I’ve got my big man (Moore) for the other guy (Henderson).”

But the big man hasn’t been as effective as in 1985 because of persistent soreness in his shoulder. Was he hurting Sunday? Mauch said that Moore wouldn’t tell him if he was, that Moore is like John Candelaria in his competitiveness.

“Here’s the dilemma with Donnie Moore,” Mauch said. “You rest him four or five days to get his arm strong and you may lose his sharpness in those four or five days.

“I guess the best thing I can tell you is that over the last couple years, since Witt became an outstanding pitcher, I haven’t had much success relieving for him--and I still haven’t.”

The media came at Mauch in waves, but he showed no sign of hurt, no real indication of emotion.

“My emotions have calluses on them this big,” he said, holding his hands six inches apart.

“I still have them (emotions), but you people make more of it than I do.”

“I exult when we win, agonize a little when we lose and then I get ready for the next game,” he said. “I’m no different than anyone else. All this really means is that when we do finally win, there’ll be the opportunity to really do something (in the way of a celebration).”

But will it be tough coming back now?

“Go ask the Red Sox,” Mauch said. “They just did it. I mean, what’s so difficult about us coming back when you consider how the Red Sox felt last night (after blowing a 3-0 lead en route to a 11-inning loss).

“If you’re talking about momentum, I’ve never believed in it. Momentum is very fickle.”

As the fates have been with Mauch.

A reporter asked if this wasn’t starting to smell like Milwaukee?

“Not at all,” Mauch said calmly. “Anyone who thinks that doesn’t know anything about the caliber of the people in that other room (the clubhouse).”

But didn’t the Angels let the Red Sox off the hook?

“We don’t ever feel that way,” he said. “I mean, when you’re going in with a Kirk McCaskill (Tuesday night), you’re not going in naked.”

Asked then if he still feels good about his chances, Mauch said, “I always feel good. Every putt I hit I think is going in, and every time I put the uniform on I think I’m going to win.”

Reggie Jackson had been standing next to Gene Mauch Sunday when it looked as if the manager was going to finally register his biggest win, when it came down to two outs in the ninth with Mauch on the dugout steps.

Was there an indication from the manager that his emotions were more than he let on to later?

Said Jackson: “You could sense the happiness there. You could see him warming up, but you could also sense that he knew it wasn’t done.

“He’s a very practical man and he never lets anything get in the way of that pragmatism.

“He never loses his intensity.”

In the silence of the clubhouse, Jackson was asked about Mauch’s moves in that ninth inning.

The two men have had differences this year, but Jackson said: “Gene Mauch made no mistakes. He had the right players out there. It was textbook, man. Hell, Gedman had hit three bullets off Witt, and Donnie Moore is still our man.”

Mauch has to feel that way, too. He has no choice. He made the choice he felt he could live with in the ninth inning. If the ghosts beat him again, they had names like Rich Gedman and Dave Henderson.