ANGELS 1988 PREVIEW SECTION : They Needed Smooth Operators to Get a Second Chance

Mention the word “staff” to some Angel pitchers and they’re not sure if you’re talking about their teammates or the gang down at the hospital. A lot of these guys are held together by surgical thread.

The tale of the Angels’ Post-Op Soap Opera will unfold this season. The team just hopes “unravel” won’t be a more appropriate term.

Along with the usual sore elbows and various expected spring ailments, there are four Angel pitchers--Kirk McCaskill, Donnie Moore, Dan Petry and Stewart Cliburn--who have yet to prove that they can regain the pre-surgery prowess that had made them among baseball’s most effective pitchers.

The following is a brief medical history from the charts of the four who were sidelined.

THE YOUNG . . .

In the spring of 1984, a promising 22-year-old hockey player named Kirk McCaskill decided to hang up his ice skates and seek fame and fortune in a more gentile endeavor. If he had stayed in hockey, he might not have many teeth left, but he probably wouldn’t have need elbow surgery.

McCaskill’s rookie season (1985) was one of potential and promise. He started 29 games and finished with a 12-12 record and a 4.70 earned run average.

His sophomore campaign was one of promise fulfilled. His record was 17-10, his ERA 3.36. He struck out 202 batters in 246 1/3 innings. He had 10 complete games and in 6 of the games he lost, his teammates managed just one run or were shut out.

In 1987, McCaskill threw just 21 innings before pain in his right elbow sent him to hospital for tests. On April 27, team orthopedist Dr. Lewis Yocum removed bone chips from the joint.

After three rehabilitation outings with the minor-league Palm Springs Angels, McCaskill was back in the majors on July 11. He pitched in relief against the Tigers that same day and followed with 10 consecutive starts. He was in the rotation, but he was also in pain.

His elbow may have been repaired but it certainly didn’t feel as good as new. It showed. After the surgery, he was 2-6 with a 6.88 ERA and lasted into the seventh inning just twice.

It’s natural to suspect that McCaskill was holding back out of fear about the surgery. In retrospect, he says, his lack of fear may have been his undoing.

“I was never tentative, he said. “If I had been tentative, it might not have been the way it was. I might have tried to come back too hard, too soon.

“My problem last year was not fear, it was pain. It (the elbow) started hurting again. Now, I know that the second pain was caused by scar tissue and as long as I stretch it out every day, I think that problem is over.”

McCaskill has been throwing free and easy since the beginning of spring training and has been impressive in the majority of his outings, getting rave reviews.

“The most encouraging thing is the way he’s been able to throw his breaking pitches, including the slider, full out,” Yocum said. “He says he feels good and I totally approve.”

Pitching coach Marcel Lachemann, who helped McCaskill develop a more-methodical approach to preparing for this season, also likes what he has seen.

“McCaskill’s shown no ill effects this spring,” he said. “He’s throwing all the same pitches that everyone who hasn’t had surgery throws. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

McCaskill says he feels great, but he’s got an elbow full of scar tissue that reminds him every day to temper his optimism.

“It’ll never be 100% of what it was because I can’t straighten my arm completely,” he said. “But I’M throwing 100% of what’s there now and my velocity has been up to 86 to 89 miles per hour, which is what it was before.

“This time, I took it slower. We prepared a much more deliberate plan. I threw three times a week at the stadium in January. Before that I just lifted weights and went to therapy. Now, I’m throwing full out and the spin on my curveball’s there. I just need to get a little more consistent.

“I’m about this far,” he said, holding his fingers two inches apart, “from being right where I want to be.”

AND THE RESTLESS

In 1985, Donnie Moore saved 31 games. In 1986, he saved 21. Then came the hanging forkball to Boston’s Dave Henderson and the downer of Game 5 of the ’86 American League Championship Series.

And then came the disaster of 1987.

Actually, Moore’s numbers last season weren’t that bad--2-2 with 5 saves and a 2.70 ERA--there just weren’t enough of them. He appeared in only 14 games because of chronic pain in his right rib cage.

Moore underwent a series of nerve-block injections for pain and countless tests. He was put on the disabled list May 29 and re-activated July 3. He pitched twice before being put on the DL again on July 11. He was reactivated Sept. 13, but was in pain the first time he tried to pitch.

Management hinted he might be malingering. The fans booed. But on Oct. 5, Moore was both relieved and vindicated.

He underwent exploratory microsurgery in Centinela Hospital and Dr. Robert Watkins removed a small bone spur that was next to his spine.

“Nobody’s ever seen anything like that before,” Yocum said. “A lot of people get nerve pain, but it’s not often we find something that can be corrected like that. There was a spur, a piece of bone about the size of a BB, just big enough to put pressure on the spine and little enough to be very hard to find.

“It didn’t show up on a number of sophisticated tests. We have no idea how long it was in there. We used two different tests and, using what Donnie was telling us to locate the area, did the exploratory and found it.”

Moore was never too crazy about all those nerve-block injections that didn’t seem to do any good. And now he doesn’t even want to talk about doctors, anymore.

A tender elbow has slowed his progress somewhat this spring, but his fastball is registering in the low 90s now and the new, old Donnie Moore could be ready for the season opener.

“The elbow is a bone spur problem that’s been there for years,” Moore said. “It bothers me in the spring a lot. Didn’t bother me last year ‘cause I didn’t pitch enough for it to hurt.

“It would have hurt a lot worse than this for me to even consider letting them cut me. My velocity is back up and I feel good. I think I’ll be ready.”

Lachemann is guardedly optimistic.

“Connie’s throwing real good,” Lachemann said. “He’s got a good forkball and a good slider. But we’re keeping an eye on him.”

The fans are watching too. A small group at Angels Stadium in Palm Springs chants “No Moore, No Moore,” everytime he comes in to pitch.

But now he can smile and say to himself, “Yeah, no more pain.”

Dan Petry was the iron man of Detroit’s starting rotation in 1986. During the first half of the ‘70s, he had 146 decisions.

On June 2, of 1986 the right arm that had carried him for the field at El Dorado High School to professional baseball at 17 years old, rebelled. He felt a sharp pain in his elbow and left the game after facing three batters.

A week later, Dr. James Andrews performed arthroscopic surgery to remove (you guessed it) three of those pesky bone chips.

Petry finished the season 5-10, his first losing season in the majors.

He began last season as a starter for the Tigers but was moved to the bullpen as a middle reliever in mid-August. He finished the season 9-7 with a 5.61 ERA. It was only the second time in eight years that he did not hit double figures in wins and the first time he did not record a complete game.

In the four seasons prior to his surgery, Petry was 67-41. In the two years since, he is 10-12.

Petry showed up on the first day of spring training in a new uniform--the Angels got him in a trade for Gary Pettis--intent on a new beginning. A week later, instead of rebuilding his career, he was rehabilitating his back instead.

He suffered severe back spasms during a fielding drill and missed more than two weeks of camp. When he did return to action, he started slowly.

“It’s been hard to tell myself that just because everyone else is throwing 100%, that doesn’t mean I should be too,” Petry said. “My back feels fine and my arm feels fine. I’m just concerned with getting everything perfected for Day 1. It’s hard not to get impatient.”

Dr. Yocum says Petry has good arm strength and Lachemann says the 29-year-old right-hander “is fine.” But Petry was shelled in his first two spring outings and--with just two weeks of exhibition play left before opening day--his ERA was 11.57.

“I’m getting stronger, throwing harder and getting more precise,” he said. “In my first outing, I was all messed up, but I feel much better about the way I’m throwing now. Stamina and strength don’t seem to be a problem, I’m confident I can get ready in time.”

The Angels, and, of course, Stewart Cliburn, are still searching for the Cliburn of 1985. You remember, the little guy who never threw a pitch more than an inch or two above a hitter’s knees. The one with the 9-3 record, 6 saves and 2.09 ERA.

That Cliburn has been missing for two years. In 1986 and ‘87, there were sightings in Edmonton, Canada, but they mere only flashes of a memory.

Cliburn underwent arthroscopic surgery Nov. 11, 1986, a procedure Yocum described as a minor clean-up job. Cliburn’s performance in the minors over the next two years would indicate it had a major effect on his effectiveness. He was a combined 1-3 with a 5.08 ERA during those two seasons at Edmonton.

Like McCaskill, Cliburn’s impatience may have been his tragic flaw. He, too, believed he could come back hard and fast. He ended up spending three months of 1987 on the disabled list because of first a forearm muscle strain, then a shoulder strain.

“I never had been hurt before and I just jumped out there and started throwing like I’d never been hurt,” Cliburn said. “It was a mistake.”

After last season, Cliburn didn’t pick up a baseball in September. Then he started throwing again and was pitching off a mound by Thanksgiving. He took December off and started over again after the holidays.

The regimen seems to have worked. Cliburn has been one of the Angels’ most impressive pitchers all spring and had a 1.93 ERA after his first five outings.”

“Stew has been outstanding,” Lachemann said. “He’s shown no ill effects from his previous arm problems and he’s done everything we’ve asked him to do. He’s actually doing some things better than before the surgery. His slider is a little better and his straight change, is much better.

“It took a lot of hard work on his part. He’s a very determined kid. It took him eight years to get to the big leagues and he’s had more than his share of setbacks. But he’s persevered and now he’s got himself back into the picture.”

Cliburn’s goal now is to make sure he does nothing to blur the image. He knows he’s pitched well, but he also knows he can’t afford any lapses. He’s a long way from having a guaranteed spot on the roster.

“At this point, I hope all I have to do is stay healthy and pitch like I have been (to make the team),” he said. “That’s all I can do. If a guy has a good year the year before, he might be able to come into camp and just get his work in.

“But I have to go out and pitch well to try and make the club. To me, every game out there this spring is like the World Series.”

If all of the Angels’ recently repaired pitching arms respond, he could be saying the same thing come autumn.