Baseball : Warning to the Angels: Big, Bad Yankees Are Coming to Town

It didn’t take Billy Martin’s latest altercation to convince his third baseman that the New York Yankees have regained the take-no-prisoners attitude of the Reggie Jackson-Thurman Munson era.

Mike Pagliarulo began talking about it in spring training and hasn’t stopped.

He uses such words as gritty and nasty. He says the Yankees finally have “enough bastards.”

The type people, he said, who will “stay together and do anything to win,” making this the type of team that “fans hate to see come to their town--pleasant off the field and unpleasant on it.”

Added Pagliarulo: “The other team may not hate us, but they hate to play us.”

He doesn’t have to convince the Angels, who will open an 8-game home stand against the Yankees Monday night.

The Angels, of course, have yet to meet a team they didn’t hate to play.

This is the latest in their 27 years of coexistence that both the Yankees and New York Mets have led their respective divisions. A Subway Series?

“I think it would be great because we wouldn’t have to travel,” first baseman Don Mattingly said. “I don’t follow (the Mets) that much, but I don’t like a lot of the things they do. I mean some of the things they do on the field.

“I’ve met a few of them off the field and they seem like good guys.

“But they do some things, like low fives and the curtain calls after home runs, that aren’t for me.

“Then again, we have Rickey (the often flamboyant Henderson).”

In honor of Martin’s 60th birthday Monday night, Yankee owner George Steinbrenner sent a magnum of champagne to his manager’s clubhouse office.

Martin said he didn’t want it and offered it to John Candelaria, who had just pitched a 3-1 victory over the Seattle Mariners. Candelaria reflected on his previous problems and turned it down.

“I’m like you,” he told Martin. “I don’t think I can handle it.”

Tim Raines merely reiterated his long-standing interest in playing for the Dodgers the other day, nothing more. As Raines himself said, first on Bud Furillo’s show on KFOX-FM, then at Dodger Stadium, “There’s no secret about it.”

The implication in one story was that Raines could become available to the Dodgers, whose payroll is already more than $18 million, by June.

No way.

Arbitrator George Nicolau may have a decision on the second collusion grievance, in which Raines’ status is at stake, sometime in June, but he will only rule on the guilt or innocence of the owners.

A guilty verdict would then require a remedy trial, spanning several months, depending on Nicolau’s schedule. Raines shouldn’t expect to receive his freedom until the season is over--if then.

Enhancing his .350 average through Thursday, best in the National League, was the fact that Chicago Cub left fielder Rafael Palmeiro had struck out only 5 times in 140 at-bats.

“When you’re that good a hitter and don’t strike out, Lord only knows how much he might hit,” Manager Don Zimmer said. “That’s been his biggest asset. He seldom swings and misses.”

Dave Stewart keeps insisting that he seldom gets the proper recognition and should have won the Cy Young Award over Roger Clemens of the Boston Red Sox last year. Clemens had not responded until Wednesday, when he said:

“I must have deserved it because I won it. All he can do is talk about it. When I walk into my house I see two Cy Young Awards with my name on them.

“They don’t have Dave Stewart’s name on them.”

Stewart, departing in the seventh inning of a 4-1 loss to the Red Sox at Boston Wednesday night, was booed by fans near the Oakland dugout, blew a kiss and later said, “They were yelling ‘Cy Young! Cy Young!’ I just wanted them to know I appreciate their support.”

Jim Rice, going into a weekend series with the Angels, reflected on his status as Boston’s left fielder and said: “I know I can still play and play every day. I know I can play with pain and that there are guys out there who can’t.”

But Rice, 35, in no pain, with no injuries, is not playing. He is hitting .233 with 3 doubles, no homers and 12 runs batted in, of which only 4 resulted from hits.

A week ago, he went to Manager John McNamara and took himself out of the lineup.

“I’m just not seeing the ball and I’m not the type to go out and embarrass myself,” Rice said.

The decision: Let Rice battle his way back in private, before games, against hitting machines and batting practice pitchers.

“I want him to have peace of mind,” McNamara said. “He got to the point where he was trying too hard to do too many things.”

Rice said: “The more I swing, the more compact my swing becomes.” When it’s compact, Rice says, the old results will surface.

But he won’t go to McNamara.

“I’m not the type to walk into the manager’s office,” Rice said. “I’ve got 14 years in the big leagues. I’ll know when I’m ready to swing the bat. I have confidence in Mac. He’ll know when I’m ready.”

Said McNamara: “I don’t think I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt. I think he can still play. What is he, 35?

“In this day and age, I don’t consider that old.”

Old enough, perhaps, for glasses. Rice is trying them in practice, but says he sweats too much to use them in games.

But if it’s a question of seeing the ball, of earning the $2 million a year salary he is guaranteed through next year, Rice conceded that he may relent.

Don’t look for a return to day games in the playoffs and World Series.

“Once you’ve sold your soul (to the TV networks), you won’t get it back,” Commissioner Peter Ueberroth told a panel of sports editors in New York the other day.

They’re selling Florida White Sox T-shirts in St. Petersburg and not selling much of anything in Chicago, where the White Sox are averaging 13,510 in attendance, a figure that is expected to slip even lower as the club descends in the American League West and massive repairs to the Dan Ryan Expressway accelerate.

Compounding the Chicago White Sox’s loss of Carlton Fisk because of a broken hand, Ivan Calderon has become virtually useless because of problems with a shoulder injury first suffered in 1985.

Calderon hit 28 homers last year and had 8 with 20 RBIs through May 4 of this year, but he has no homers and just 1 RBI since. He is batting .193 with 37 strikeouts in 135 at-bats and said he can’t check his swing, pull the ball or “do anything.”

Both the Toronto Sun and the Xerox Corporation, through its connections with the Canadian Broadcasting Company, are conducting fan surveys on the question of whether Blue Jay Manager Jimy Williams should be fired.

Williams’ response? “Just say no.”

The St. Louis Cardinals may never completely replace Jack Clark, but they may ultimately prosper by his departure.

The Yankees’ signing of Clark will result in the Cardinals getting 3 of the first 30 picks in next month’s amateur draft, including the Yankees’ first-round pick, their own first-round pick and a supplemental choice after the first round.

The Cardinals, perhaps, have been baseball’s most successful team in the amateur draft.

Their last eight No. 1 picks are all playing in the majors: 1981, Bobby Meacham, now with the Yankees; 1982, Todd Worrell; 1983, Jim Lindeman; 1984, Mike Dunne, now with the Pittsburgh Pirates; 1985, Joe Magrane; 1986, Luis Alicea; 1987, Cris Carpenter.

Five other first-round picks by the Cardinals are also in the majors, dating back to Ted Simmons, who was drafted in 1967 and is now with the Atlanta Braves. Others include: 1974, Garry Templeton, now with the San Diego Padres; 1976, Leon Durham, now with the Cincinnati Reds; 1977, Terry Kennedy, now with the Baltimore Orioles, and 1979, Andy Van Slyke, now with the Pirates.

Delivering 24 RBIs in his first 24 games with the Cardinals, Tom Brunansky, the former Minnesota Twin, has impressed his new team in a variety of ways.

“This guy is a much better player than any of us thought,” shortstop Ozzie Smith said. “What was Minnesota thinking?”

Bo Jackson continues to grow into a complete player. The Kansas City Royal left fielder nailed two runners attempting to take extra bases in Wednesday’s game with the Twins and leads the Royals in outfield assists with 6, in home runs with 8 and in stolen bases with 10.

“I want to continue to show they can’t run on me,” Bo said. “When they try to take the extra base, it’s like they’re trying to show me up. They’re going to lose 90% of the time.”

Manager Roger Craig of the San Francisco Giants was upset Wednesday when an appeal by the Philadelphia Phillies cost his team a run, Kevin Mitchell being cited for having missed third base.

“It’s a bad umpire making a bad call,” charged Craig.

The umpire? Dave Pallone of Pete Rose fame.

Zane Smith, who started three days earlier and is plagued by bone chips in his elbow, was used in relief by Atlanta Manager Chuck Tanner Monday night and had to be scratched from a scheduled start in Pittsburgh Friday night.

That incident is said to have deepened General Manager Bobby Cox’s disapproval of Tanner’s work as manager.