Angels Make Their Message Clear, 10-2

Hold the trumpets and fanfare.

If this is the Angels’ run at first place, Chili Davis would prefer it to be a quiet charge, the better to catch the Oakland Athletics off guard.

But tiptoeing to the top probably became impossible for the Angels Sunday, after they had three home runs and eight extra-base hits in beating the Tigers, 10-2, at Anaheim Stadium.

“I would rather have it be a surprise, just play well and make it a surprise,” Davis said after the Angels won for the sixth time in their last eight games and moved within 7 1/2 games of Oakland, their smallest deficit since May 5.

“We’re just dealing with the team in front of us, and that’s Chicago. They come in here (with a 6 1/2 game lead over the Angels) and we can take care of it. Our last three games are against Oakland.

“Oakland’s in front right now, but not by much. They won the World Series and the division and they’re the team to beat, but there’s no guarantee come Oct 1, 2 and 3 it’s going to be the Oakland A’s in first place. They’re the team to beat, but right now, the team for us to beat is Chicago.”

Davis helped beat former Angel Frank Tanana (5-5) Sunday with a three-run home run in the first inning, his third home run in four at-bats over two games. Davis was not in the original starting lineup but was inserted as the left fielder when Devon White experienced a recurrence of a ribcage muscle strain.

“I came here expecting to play, anyway,” said Davis, who had homered twice against Jeff Robinson Saturday. “I was surprised when I looked at the lineup. Either you go in and try to do something or it’s a waste of a day.”

He didn’t waste the chance to slam Tanana’s first-pitch curveball over the center-field fence, to the right of the 404-foot sign. “I don’t think he threw that pitch any more today,” Davis said.

Tanana threw two more home-run pitches, one to Kent Anderson in the fourth for Anderson’s first major league home run and another to Lance Parrish for a two-run drive off the left field foul pole in the fifth. “They hit the ball a long ways,” Tanana said after the Tigers lost their fourth in five games and fell 7 1/2 games behind Toronto in the American League East. “We can’t make plays on balls that are going out of the ballpark.”

Anderson considered his home run atonement for having dropped Cecil Fielder’s first-inning pop-up, which allowed Alan Trammell to score from first with Detroit’s first run. Anderson didn’t realize the ball was in his glove and let it fall when he spun around to check behind him.

“Chili came up and hit that three-run home run, which eased my conscience,” Anderson said.

It also made Sunday an easy day for Angel starter Kirk McCaskill (6-3), who had no elbow problems over seven solid innings and did not allow an earned run for the third time in his past six starts. Both Detroit runs resulted from errors, the first by Anderson and the second on McCaskill’s wild pickoff throw to first after Scott Lusader had walked in the fifth. Lusader scored on Mark Salas’ ground out to cut the Angels’ lead to 4-2, but Parrish padded that to 6-2 in the bottom of the inning with his 14th home run of the season.

The Angels added four more runs in the sixth off Tanana and Lance McCullers, with Brian Downing contributing an RBI-double and Donnie Hill an RBI-single to ensure McCaskill’s fourth victory in his last five decisions.

“It was nice to go seven innings, but whether you go five, six or seven, the bottom line is winning and it was nice to contribute,” said McCaskill, whose 5 1/2-week-old son, Riley, was in the crowd of 35,566.

“I felt strong physically when I came out, but the problem in the past has been tightness after we had long innings and we had that long sixth inning,” McCaskill said.

“You’ve got to give all the credit today to the offense. Any time you score as many runs as we did today and hit like we did, it’s a good sign.”

Parrish took it as sign of good things to come in the Angels’ series with the White Sox, from whom they took two of three games last week.

“If we play the way we did today, we should have a pretty good time,” he said.

“This is the time for us to start making our move (when) the team in first place has run into a little stagnant period. Based on the way we played Chicago in Chicago we should be very optimistic.”

They’ve been optimistic, if quietly, all along, Davis insisted.

“We dug ourselves a hole early in the season. I don’t think anybody gave up and it’s showing now,” Davis said. “We all watch the scoreboard, but we have to concentrate on winning our ballgames, too. If we don’t it’s not going to matter.”

Angel Notes

Second baseman Johnny Ray, eligible to come off the 15-day disabled list today, isn’t ready to be activated. “I’m not quite there yet. I only started throwing a few days ago,” said Ray, who has been plagued by bursitis and other problems in his right shoulder. “It feels a lot better. The arm strength is the main thing, and that’s good. It shouldn’t be too much longer.”

Reliever Scott Bailes, who was struck on the left forearm by a line drive hit by Lou Whitaker Saturday, felt fine Sunday but was held out of the game as a precaution by Manager Doug Rader. Bailes expects to be able to pitch today. . . . Given Bailes’ bruised arm, Rader was especially glad to get seven innings from starter Kirk McCaskill. “We really needed a good outing from him and we got it,” said Rader, who intended to bring Mike Fetters in for the seventh inning but had to wait because Fetters hadn’t finished warming up. “To go seven on about 80 pitches was great.”

Major-league home run leader Cecil Fielder has gone seven games without a home run, his longest stretch of the season. The Tigers have gone four games without a homer, their longest drought this season. . . . Detroit’s two unearned runs increased the total scored against the Angels this season to 48, matching their 1989 total.

Dante Bichette ended an 0-for-18 slump with a second-inning single but was hitless in his following three at-bats. . . . The Angels’ three-home run game was their eighth this season, all at Anaheim Stadium. They’ve hit four homers in a game three times, all on the road.

ANGEL ATTENDANCE Sunday: 35,566

1990 (36 dates): 1,180,120

1989 (36 dates): 1,081,621

Increase: 98,499

1990 Average: 32,781