Angel-Oriole Battle of Losers Rained Out

The gods must be baseball fans, and discerning ones at that, judging from the rain clouds that assembled above Memorial Stadium a half-hour before game time and washed out Tuesday’s night’s scheduled meeting between the Baltimore Orioles (5-31) and the Angels (14-23).

If this showdown between the teams with the worst records in the American League must go on, it will have to wait at least until today, when the Angels’ Mike Witt (1-4) tries it again against Oriole rookie Jose Bautista (0-2). Tuesday night’s rainout is scheduled to be made up Thursday as part of a twi-night doubleheader, beginning at 2:05 p.m., PDT.

“Maybe that’s what we needed,” said Angel Manager Cookie Rojas, whose team has lost 10 of its last 14 games, being outscored, 15-4, in the last two.

The way these clubs are going, rainouts qualify as highlights, although the idle Angels dropped a half-game to Oakland in the AL West standings and now trail the first-place Athletics by 13 1/2 games.

Still, the Angels claimed to be thankful for small favors.

“Sometimes, having time off like this can give you a fresh start,” Angel designated hitter Brian Downing said. “We’ll basically have from late Sunday to Wednesday night off. We can sit back for three days or so and get mentally refreshed.

“It’s like when I sat out while I was on the DL. I came back and the pressing was gone. You can relax a little and think about the pitch you want to hit, rather than going after the pitcher’s pitch. Maybe that can work on a team basis. I know it worked for me.”

Downing may have been the only Angel who stood to lose from a postponement, having just regained his home-run stroke over the weekend. In the Angels’ three-game series in New York, Downing went 7 for 13 with 3 home runs and 5 RBIs.

A day off Monday and a rainout Tuesday have now interrupted that groove.

“I’m not really pleased about that,” Downing admitted, “but that’s the way it goes. I couldn’t get a rainout when I was struggling.”

And although the rain will force Witt to wait an extra day, giving him six days’ rest between starts, Rojas insisted it wouldn’t affect his pitcher.

“I don’t think it’ll make any difference,” Rojas said. “We’ve looked at videotapes and whatever Witt was doing wrong mechanically, Marcel (Lachemann, Angel pitching coach,) straightened out. Witt’s last two outings have been good. I think we’ve corrected the problem.”

Rojas will also use his other scheduled starters for this series, Kirk McCaskill and Dan Petry, to pitch Thursday’s doubleheader. McCaskill (2-3) will face Mike Boddicker (0-8) in the first game, followed by Petry (2-3) and Jay Tibbs (2-0) in the second.

Angel Notes

Wally Joyner has 2 hits in his last 17 at-bats and just 5 RBIs in his last 23 games, the last coming May 8. As he readied for a round of batting practice, Joyner grabbed a bat in the Angel dugout, stared at it and told a group of reporters as he approached the batting cage: “Well, wish me luck.” . . . DeWayne Buice, Chili Davis and Chuck Finley used Monday’s off-day to take a tour of Washington. “Chili knows a senator, John McCain of Arizona, and he gave us the grand tour,” Buice said. “We saw both sides of the Capitol Building, we walked on the floor of the House of Representatives and we rode in the same elevator as Paul Simon.”