Angels Blow Double Play, Lose, 3-2, to Orioles in 11

Baseball scorekeepers know it as one of their primary commandments, and in the bottom of the 11th inning Saturday night, the Angels became painfully re-acquainted with it:

Never under any circumstances, assume the double play.

Even when Eddie Murray, an average baserunner, is moving from first base to second.

Even when Terry Kennedy, Baltimore’s human slow-motion replay, is plodding from the batter’s box to first base.

Even when Mark McLemore, the Angels’ slick-fielding second baseman, is poised and ready to turn two and assure an Angel victory.

“Nothing’s automatic,” said McLemore, who drove the point home forcefully when his 11th-inning error on Kennedy’s sure-thing grounder enabled the Baltimore Orioles to turn a 2-1 deficit into a 3-2 win before 17,092 at Memorial Stadium.

The Angels had just taken the lead in the top of the inning, on Jim Eppard’s run-scoring pinch-double, and had assigned relief pitcher Greg Minton to protect it. Minton struck out the first batter he faced, Cal Ripken, and walked the second, Murray.

That brought up Kennedy, a .210-hitting catcher who also happens to be the slowest thing in Baltimore this side of midday traffic.

Kennedy bounced a grounder right at McLemore, a late-inning defensive replacement for Johnny Ray. McLemore crouched and gloved the ball.

“It can’t be any more tailor-made,” Angel catcher Bob Boone said.

But then McLemore whirled and tried to throw to shortstop Dick Schofield to begin the potential game-ending double play.

Instead, the ball squirted loose from McLemore’s grasp, and by the time it landed on the dirt, Murray was safe at second and Kennedy had trudged all the way to first.

The game would continue.

For Minton, that meant serving up a game-tying ground-ball single to pinch-hitter Larry Sheets, an intentional walk to Jim Traber and a game-winning sacrifice fly to pinch-hitter Jim Dwyer.

“What can you do?” Angel Manager Cookie Rojas said with a postgame shrug. “Mac dropped the ball.

“What if Mac caught it? If, if, if. We lost, 3-2. That’s what counts.”

Minton had a pretty fair idea of what would’ve happened had McLemore caught the ball.

“It was Kennedy running. What do you think?” Minton said. “It’s pretty self-explanatory. I know Kennedy from San Diego and he can’t run a lick. I’ll be honest--mentally, I told myself, ‘Good, we did our job and we won.’

“It doesn’t always work out that way, though.”

McLemore concurred with Minton.

“It would’ve been a double play,” McLemore said. “In a situation like that, I just have to catch the ball and throw it. And I didn’t do it.”

It rained throughout most of the day in Baltimore Saturday and the infield grass and dirt were still damp by the 11th inning. But McLemore refused to use the wet grounds--and a wet baseball--as an excuse.

“No,” he said. “I just missed it.”

Rojas, meanwhile, maintained that the game never should have reached the 11th inning.

“We should have won in nine innings, 2-1,” Rojas said, “but that’s the breaks of the game.”

Rojas was referring to the fifth inning, when, with Schofield on second base and Darrell Miller on first, Devon White tried to sacrifice--and instead wound up forcing Schofield at third base. Johnny Ray followed with a deep drive that Baltimore right fielder Fred Lynn snared with a spectacular leaping catch--a ball that would have easily scored Schofield from third.

Of course, Rojas could have also referred to the ninth inning, when, with runners on first and second with one out, he refused to pinch-hit for the slumping Miller, who has 2 hits in his last 33 at-bats.

Miller struck out.

And when White followed with a ground out, the Angels had blown a prime tie-breaking opportunity.

Two innings later, the same situation presented itself to Rojas: One out, runners on first and second, Miller due up.

This time, Rojas inserted Eppard.

This time, the Angels scored a run when he doubled into the left-field corner.

What about the ninth inning? Rojas was asked.

“I only had a runner on first in the ninth inning,” Rojas said, apparently forgetting about Jack Howell, who was leading off second base at the time.

“I would’ve needed two singles to score the run. In the 11th, I only needed one single.”

In this instance, Rojas’ memory was as faulty as McLemore’s fielding.

And so, the game would indeed come down to McLemore. And then to Minton, who would suffer his third defeat in six decisions.

“Right after the error, I turned around and pumped my fist at Mac,” Minton said. “I’m thinking, ‘If I get this next guy, I get Mac off the hook and still get the team the win.’ ”

Instead, Minton lost a pair of confrontations with pinch-hitters Sheets and Dwyer--and the Angels lost their second straight game to the 42-80 Orioles.

“I had my chances,” Minton conceded.

“But, like anybody else, I wish it didn’t have to come down to that.”

Angel Notes

Through the first 18 regulation innings of this series, the Angels managed two runs against Baltimore pitching. During Friday’s 3-1 loss, the Angels’ lone run came in the first inning when Devon White reached second base on a bloop double and scored on two infield outs. Saturday, it was again White in the first inning, this time on a leadoff home run, his 10th of the season. The Angels would not score again until Jim Eppard’s pinch-double in the 11th.. . .In the process, the Angels wasted two strong pitching performances by Jack Lazorko and Bryan Harvey. Lazorko, recalled from Edmonton to replace the injured Kirk McCaskill, took an 8.64 ERA into his third Angel start of the season. He left, 6 innings later, having allowed just one run on five hits. Then, following a two-out stint by Sherman Corbett, Harvey came to work 2 hitless innings. Harvey faced seven batters and struck out five, including Jim Traber, Rene Gonzales and Bill Ripken in succession.

Terry Kennedy, who scored the game-deciding run, entered the game only after Baltimore’s starting catcher, Mickey Tettleton, was ejected by home-plate umpire Dave Phillips in the ninth inning. Tettleton’s offense? Protesting Phillips’ limit on the number warm-up pitches allowed Oriole pitcher Jose Bautista before the ninth. The rule book allows for eight warm-up pitches--and that’s precisely how many Bautista threw. “All well and good,” Baltimore Manager Frank Robinson said. “But that has been (enforced) all season by any umpire crews.”