Mariners Shut Out Angels

The Seattle Mariners, lowest of the lowly a little more than a week ago, tied a club record by winning their eighth consecutive game Tuesday.

Their 2-0 victory over the Angels before 20,446 in Anaheim Stadium means at least two things. Owner Jeff Smulyan’s good-luck tie might be getting grimy after nine days of wear, and Manager Jim Lefebvre can keep his hot pink-and-black, tiger-striped body suit where it belongs--on a hanger.

Lefebvre got the suit from a friend when the team was 0-5.

“I was going to put it on and walk out in front of the whole team and say, ‘I want you guys to relax,’ ” Lefebvre said.

But before he did that, the team started winning. They went from 0-6 to 8-6, including a sweep of the Oakland Athletics.

“This is new ground for all of us,” Mariner first baseman Pete O’Brien. “We all believed we could do it. This is not a surprise for us. If you expect it, it shouldn’t surprise you. This ballclub knows it’s special.”

The Mariner record of eight consecutive wins was set June 20-29, 1985.

The Angels lost their third game in a row and were shut out for the second time this season.

Scott Lewis, the rookie who won the spot in the rotation left open by Bert Blyleven’s injury, pitched more than five scoreless innings, but they all came after a two-run first.

Lewis (1-1) ran into two-out trouble in the first. He walked Ken Griffey Jr., who stole second and scored on a single by Edgar Martinez.

Martinez went to third base on Alvin Davis’ single and scored on a single by O’Brien.

“I got two quick outs and made a couple of good pitches and before you know it they had two runs,” Lewis said.

Manager Doug Rader urged patience.

“The bottom line is that we have averaged two runs a game for five games now,” he said. “We’ve been lucky to win a couple of them. The most important aspect is to maintain your patience. Every ballclub on earth is going to go through something like this. We have a very fine offense, and it will surface.”

Scott Bankhead (1-1), who had not won since September of 1989 after missing most of last season after surgery to remove bone spurs in his shoulder, pitched seven innings, allowing five hits. Russ Swan earned the save, the first of his career.

“Is Bankhead back or what?” Lefebvre said. “Tonight, when Bankhead needed to make the pitch, he made it.”

The Angels put a runner on third base in the second, third, seventh and eighth innings but came up empty every time.

Lance Parrish singled with two out in the second inning and went to third on Gary Gaetti’s double. But Junior Felix grounded to first for the third out.

In the third inning, Luis Polonia reached on a fielder’s choice and stole second and third on consecutive pitches. But he was stranded on Dick Schofield’s one-hop shot to the pitcher and Wally Joyner’s grounder to deep short.

Dave Winfield led off the seventh with a double to left and went to third on Dave Parker’s groundout to first--Parker’s ninth consecutive hitless at-bat.

Bankhead got Parrish out on a tapper back to the mound and Gary Gaetti grounded out to third base.

Swan put runners on first and third bases with two out in the eighth inning on Polonia’s bunt single and Schofield’s single to right. But Swan escaped when Joyner grounded to third.

Lewis settled after the first inning, but it was already too late. He allowed a two-out single to Ken Griffey in the second inning, but got Griffey Jr., batting behind his father, to pop foul.

He was the first of nine in a row Lewis retired before allowing a single to Griffey Jr. in the fifth inning--with two out, naturally. Lewis got the third out, no damage done, on a fly ball by Martinez.

The trouble he couldn’t escape came in the seventh, when he was relieved after loading the bases with two out on a walk, a double to Griffey Jr. and another walk.

Lewis was relieved by left-hander Scott Bailes, who struck out Davis.

Bailes prevented more runs, but it didn’t matter. Two were enough.