Free-Agent Fray May Fry Angels

Mike Port isn’t returning phone calls these days--must be busy learning new words--so we are left to wonder how he must feel about a couple of this week’s more perplexing free-agent signings.

Gary Pettis to the Texas Rangers for $2.66 million.

Tony Pena to the Boston Red Sox for $6.4 million.

One suspects that Port, to borrow from Dana Carvey’s George Bush routine on “Saturday Night Live,” views the situation this way:

Pettis . . . good.

Pena . . . bad.

Yesterday’s Angel ulcer, Pettis can now gnaw the nerves of an American League West rival. And, for three years. What kind of thinking enters an organizational decision to hitch up long-term with a 31-year-old outfielder who strikes out 100 times a year, homers once a year--and will do it for almost $1 million a year?

This time last winter, the Rangers were rounding up some major names, making some major moves. Nolan Ryan. Julio Franco. Rafael Palmeiro.

They finished fourth.

Now, they set about righting things by enlisting the center fielder from the worst team in baseball, a spark plug behind that Detroit assault on 103 defeats, a man who drove in 18 runs in 444 at-bats and didn’t drive home a runner from third base until, oh, about Labor Day.

Fifth place, anyone?

In fairness, the Rangers did have to do something about their outfield defense, since nobody else was. Texas outfielders committed 29 errors in 1989--15 by the men most likely to flank Pettis in 1990, Pete Incaviglia and Ruben Sierra.

Pettis, a multiple Gold Glove winner, will no doubt help here and get in some extra leg work. But at what cost? Is a vacuum in center field worth a black hole in the batting order?

The Angels and the Tigers have their opinions.

Pena, the new and very rich catcher of the Red Sox, won’t have an American League at-bat until April, but his impact will be felt in Anaheim sometime before Jan. 8.

In 1989, at age 32, Pena batted .259 with four home runs and 37 RBIs for St. Louis. Contrast those numbers to the ones owned by 33-year-old Angel catcher Lance Parrish--.238, 17 home runs, 50 RBIs--who was recently granted free agency under arbitrator George Nicolau’s Collusion II ruling.

Parrish now has more than a month to cut a new deal. With the Angels in 1989, Parrish made $1 million, plus $210,000 in bonuses. In the open market, post-Pena, he will be worth at least twice that much, hardly encouraging news for an Angel team trying to bankroll a run at Mark Langston and/or Robin Yount.

And if the Angels don’t pay?

How does a catching platoon of Bill Schroeder and John Orton grab you?

Or maybe Parrish will head for Kansas City, which will annoy Bob Boone, who will head back to Anaheim, where we’ll all be back where we started.

Just another headache for Port, the Angel vice president who is presently bunkered down, away from media headaches. Port isn’t talking to reporters, at least not until the winter meetings this weekend, but he will permit reporters to fax him questions and he’ll fax his responses back.

Provided his adjectives don’t overload your fax machine.

If this seems a silly way to run a baseball operation, remember that Port has always mistaken the initials for California Angels to be CIA.

This is a strange time on the baseball calendar. Teams scramble to sign marginal free agents, as well as their own unsigned, before heading into the annual tradefest, scheduled this month in Nashville. The more chips to play with, the better.

This is why teams do things like signing Candy Maldonado for $825,000, as the Cleveland Indians just did. Maldonado, vilified in San Francisco as the great ball-and-chain around the ankle of the Giants, batted .217 with 41 RBIs in 1989, eventually losing his right-field assignment to Pat Sheridan.

But Maldonado had two 85-RBI seasons in San Francisco under the instruction of batting coach Jose Morales, who now holds the same position in Cleveland. The Indians are apparently hoping that a reunion of teacher and student will dust off those 85-RBI seasons.

Under the same thinking, the Angels ought to bring Richie Allen out of retirement. Allen had a great season in ‘69, playing alongside Deron Johnson, who now coaches the Angel hitters.

Look elsewhere and you’ll see the New York Yankees shelling out $9 million for Pascual Perez and Mel Hall, St. Louis stuffing $6 million into the pockets of Bryn Smith and Pittsburgh buying Walt Terrell for $3.6 million.

Just another week in the life of hot stove baseball, the season between the seasons, where 26 teams place their yearly bets, set up a few 28-year-olds for life and cringe as they head into the next summer-long plunge.

In this league, the hot stove warms for some, but leaves most others with scorch marks.