BASEBALL / ROSS NEWHAN : Short Spring Means Pitching Strain Early in the Season

It is not clear, in the aftermath of an abbreviated spring, whether pitchers are ahead of hitters or hitters are ahead of pitchers, but this much seems certain: The stamina of the starters--predicted to be diminished--has been just that, straining staffs and altering strategy.

Don’t be deceived by the Mark Langston-Mike Witt no-hitter for the Angels, or the Tim Belcher complete game for the Dodgers or the five shutouts in the first 30 games of the regular season.

Those 30 games required 225 pitchers, an average of 7.5 pitchers a game compared to a 5.5 average in 1989.

The starting pitchers had a solid earned-run average of 3.47 for the 30 games but averaged only five innings a start, and 33 starters pitched five or fewer innings.

“Basically, everyone is a middle relief pitcher right now,” Seattle Mariner Manager Jim Lefebvre said.

It will straighten out, of course, by the end of April, when rosters are reduced from 27 players to 24 or 25--the decision is still to be made on that. One or two more turns through the rotation and endurance will be up, the number of relief appearances down.

But the first week of the delayed season, it is believed, has had an impact. The feeling that the owners’ 32-day spring lockout, reducing training to three weeks, might lead to a permanent reduction in the normal camp time of six or seven weeks now seems unlikely.

Managers and general managers are expected to voice strong opposition to any significant curtailment when the owners’ Player Relations Committee, which may first discuss the subject at a meeting next week, undertakes what general counsel Charles O’Connor calls a systematic survey later this summer.

The expected response is that six weeks are necessary if the goal is to:

--Prepare starting pitchers to go a distance and hitters to handle breaking and off-speed pitches.

--Allow management enough time to measure the merits of young players.

--Reduce the risk of injury.

“It’s not so much conditioning as competitive subconscious, players reaching back, trying to do too much, trying to beat the clock,” Lefebvre said. “We’re seeing pulls and panics because of it. I mean, guys who are going seven or eight innings now are going to have trouble down the line. We’re going to see dead arms the next time.

“I think it takes six weeks, and I would absolutely oppose three again. You just can’t get it all done. That’s my opinion, but I think it’s the opinion of all the other managers I’ve talked to as well.”

Marcel Lachemann, the Angel pitching coach, agreed. “We’re all in the same boat, we all have to make the best of what we have, but I don’t think anybody thinks this is the way it should be done again.”

Kevin Mitchell overcame chronic soreness in his right wrist last year to hit 47 home runs, help the San Francisco Giants win a National League pennant and earn the NL’s most valuable player award.

The soreness has now turned to almost constant pain, Mitchell says, and there is a possibility he will require surgery to remove recently discovered bone spurs. An operation would put him on the sideline four weeks. He is taking oral cortisone in an attempt to control the swelling and remain in the lineup on a semi-regular basis.

“He’ll go as far as the pain allows him to,” batting instructor Dusty Baker said. “Some days, he won’t be able to take batting practice; he’ll have to save it for the game.”

The condition is compounded by the fact that Mitchell swings a 35-ounce bat, the heaviest on the team, and has the tendency to check swings, putting stress on his wrists.

A lighter bat?

“I can suggest things to Mitch but I can’t make him do anything. I know he doesn’t feel comfortable with a lighter bat,” Baker said. “The wrists are where it all starts for a hitter, and I know Mitch is having problems.”

Aside from the physical hurdles, Mitchell faces something of a baseball jinx as he attempts to equal or improve on last season--the 45th time a player has hit 47 or more homers.

Forty-two times, the player has fallen off the next year, with an average decline of 13.9 homers. In fact, only two players have recorded improvement, Babe Ruth doing it twice and Willie Mays once.

Ruth went from 54 homers in 1920 to 59 in ‘21, and from 47 homers in 1926 to 60 in ’27. Mays went from 47 homers in 1964 to 52 in ’65.

The Giants have already had one key player submit to surgery. Pitcher Kelly Downs had a shoulder tear repaired Thursday and will be out eight to 10 weeks. His replacement, Russ Swan, was bombed in his Wednesday debut. Manager Roger Craig can point to the fact that the Giants overcame a series of injuries last year, when they began their title pursuit with a 12-12 April.

“I’d like to be better than that, but the way this club is I’d be satisfied (with 12-12),” Craig said. “We’ve got to stay close until we get healthy.”

With a weak bullpen, Manager Whitey Herzog of the St. Louis Cardinals does not hide his interest in relief pitcher Lee Smith of the Boston Red Sox.

Herzog seems willing to trade any of three outfielders eligible for free agency at the end of the season--Tom Brunansky, Willie McGee and Vince Coleman. A fourth outfielder, Milt Thompson, recently signed a three-year contract.

“Tell me who you would rather have--four outfielders or a bullpen,” Herzog said. “We’d have a better chance of winning if we had Lee Smith rather than any of those four.

“Maybe if any of the three were signed, I wouldn’t be talking about this, but if we die with those three, what do we get--three draft choices?”

Smith, also being pursued by the Atlanta Braves and several other teams, became expendable when the Red Sox signed free agent Jeff Reardon for $6.8 million.

Recently, however, the situation has changed. Smith’s trade value soared when he saved two of three games and helped preserve the third in Boston’s season-opening sweep of the Detroit Tigers. Unless overwhelmed, the Red Sox are also less inclined to deal Smith because of concern over Reardon’s ailing back.

The Red Sox, fearing that they may have obtained damaged goods, recently called the Minnesota Twins to see if Reardon’s ailment was a chronic problem.

If so, it didn’t seem to inhibit his availability and effectiveness during three seasons with the Twins. Reardon made 191 appearances and saved 104 games in that time.

Doctors continue to assure Herzog that he will have relief ace Todd Worrell back by midseason. Worrell has had two elbow operations since December, and Herzog is skeptical.

“They say the operations were successful, but that only means he didn’t die,” Herzog said. “How do they know they were successful until he is back pitching like he was? It’s like a man in a coffin with a coat and tie on, and people stop and say, ‘Doesn’t he look good?’ Good? Hell, he’s dead.”

The Cardinals’ desperation prompted them to sign relief pitcher Tom Niedenfuer, recently released by the Mariners, to a minor league contract. Herzog alluded to the home runs Niedenfuer yielded to Ozzie Smith and Jack Clark during the 1985 playoff series with the Dodgers and said:

“We had to give him a job after all he had done for us.”

Before his debut with the Montreal Expos Tuesday, Oil Can Boyd told the St. Louis Sun that he wished he had never pitched in Boston, that he faced bigotry every day, that no black should be asked to deal with the kind of mentality that suggests: “If you can’t pick cotton, it’s out the door.”

Boyd gained credit for a 6-4 victory over the Cardinals in his first start, and said all he wants to do now is go to the mound and “harmonate,” that “all that other stuff is irrelevant.”

Sweet Music again: Frank Viola was a disappointing 13-17 with the Twins and the New York Mets last season, but in Game 2 of the new season he went 7 2/3 shutout innings against Pittsburgh, striking out eight and walking none.

“I fell in love with my changeup and curve and used them too much,” Viola said of his 1989 performance. “I’m going out this year extensively with my fastball. It makes everything else better.”

Because of the Bay Area earthquake, the loss of four free agents during the winter and the 32-day lockout, the Oakland A’s figure that they have never really had the chance to celebrate properly and to absorb their World Series victory, which gives them added motivation in pursuit of another.

“We never had a parade,” third baseman Carney Lansford said. “It was our choice. We wanted to show respect (to the earthquake victims). We didn’t pop champagne. A lot of us feel deprived. We were the quietest world champions ever. Dave Stewart didn’t even get a chance to say he was going to Disneyland.”