In This Race, Angels Steer Into the Wall on First Lap

The Angels have begun their September swoon a little early this season, but then, Luis Polonia was supposed to give them more speed.

It’s over. Look at the calendar. Look at the standings. Friday is the 11th of May. The Angels are 11 games back.

That’s tough to do, even if you’re trying.

Now look at the Athletics. Their record on the same day is 21-6. They’re playing at a pace of .778. They’re playing with everyone in the lineup.

It’s over.

So what’s your definition of runaway inflation? The Angels have theirs. Not only won’t $16 million buy a pennant anymore, it won’t even keep you in the race for five weeks.

The Angels is dead. It isn’t Mark Langston’s fault, although his 2-3 record hasn’t helped much, but he was never the answer anyway. The acquisition of Langston was significant, mostly, for the possibilities it created.

Namely, more acquisitions.

Langston gave the Angels a surplus of pitching, which was supposed to give Mike Port the ammunition to correct an offensive deficiency. Trade a pitcher, gain a hitter. It was the logical, and essential, next step.

But the second shoe never dropped. Port made one trade all winter--to bring in another pitcher, Scott Bailes. He entered the season standing pat and with fingers crossed, hoping that Dick Schofield might transform into Cal Ripken overnight and that Lance Parrish might turn back the clock a half-dozen years.

That’s the new Angel mind-set. In 1979, it was Yes We Can. Today, it’s We Hope We Can.

To have any chance of hanging with the A’s, the Angels needed an impact move--a Joe Carter, an Ellis Burks, or, more realistically, both--that never came. All baseball fans play the match-up game. Didn’t Port? Left field: Rickey Henderson or Chili Davis? Right field: Jose Canseco or Claudell Washington? Third base: Carney Lansford or Jack Howell?

Reality check, anyone?

When it came to assessing, and assembling, this Angel team, Port made two mistakes. The first is Port’s chip-on-the-shoulder approach to the trade table. “I’m ready to be overwhelmed,” Port always quips, which sounds glib and cute and will never get the job done in the real world. In the real world--and this excludes the New York Yankees--nothing comes free. To get the goods, or the greats, a price must be paid, a price Port has refused to pay.

Why? Because Port’s other mistake is the way he has evaluated his team’s talent. In short, Port has overrated the Angels.

Two years ago, we kept hearing about The Best Young Infield in Baseball. Wally Joyner at first, Mark McLemore at second, Howell at third, Schofield at short. Port kept comparing Howell to Gary Gaetti. Cookie Rojas, then the Angels’ field manager, kept saying he’d rather have Schofield than Ozzie Smith.

You will notice that the Angels’ field manager now is named Doug Rader.

Joyner has settled into the type of player all the scouts said he’d be coming out of triple-A--a .290ish hitter, a smooth fielder, an 80-RBI man with some power, but certainly not the stuff that taunted the Angels with 34 home runs in 1987. Nothing wrong with that.

Elsewhere, however, expectations have exceeded results.

Howell has developed, not into Gary Gaetti, but into Steve Buechele with a better glove. He hit .228 last season. He is hitting .218 this season. He’s 28 and in his fourth full season, so by now, you have a pretty good idea of what you’re getting when you write his name into the starting lineup.

Schofield, meanwhile, has developed the worst injury known to man--the Torn Rotator Hamstring. Pulled hamstrings can be bad things, and two of them wiped out the Lakers in the 1989 NBA Finals, but Magic Johnson and Byron Scott came back to play again. No one’s yet sure about Schofield.

Schofield first hurt the hamstring in March. It is now May. The Angel trainers say Schofield has regressed in his rehabilitation and they’ve taken the timetable for his return off the table.

Ever hear of a career-ending hamstring pull? Stay tuned.

Schofield’s pain was supposed to have been McLemore’s gain, the foot in the door McLemore has been looking for ever since Johnny Ray showed up. McLemore would get a chance to play shortstop and would get a chance to show he could hit major-league pitching.

McLemore’s batting average after 29 games: .136.

Add Devon White’s arrested development into the equation and the Angels have the look of a team that has found its level. A mediocre team, in its prime.

If the Angel front office is fooling itself, Angel fans no longer are. I spent Wednesday night’s game, a 9-1 loss to Baltimore, in the stands and listened as some fans booed White and others laughed as each pathetic batting average was flashed upon the scoreboard.

“We’ve only got one guy who’s hitting,” said one of them. “The French guy.”

Dante Bichette is no foreigner, but his current average--.295--does speak a different language than those surrounding him in the Angel batting order.

Where do the Angels go from here? First place is already gone and it won’t be long before everybody else in the American League West is choking on Oakland’s exhaust fumes. These seasons happen. The A’s are on a pace to win 126 games, but probably will slack off to 110.

Port and Rader shouldn’t waste the next 4 1/2 months. They should try some things. Keep Bichette in the lineup and see what happens. Keep Polonia in the leadoff spot. Play John Orton. Bring up Gary Disarcina, the Angel shortstop prospect with the healthy hamstring. Maybe place a call to Mike Fetters too.

Play it as if it’s September.

The Angels already are.