Angels Turn On Power, 7-2

First, Dave Parker sent his wife, Kellye, birthday greetings on the Anaheim Stadium message board.

Then, to make the occasion even more festive for his wife, Parker sent a 2-and-0 pitch from Red Sox reliever Joe Hesketh over the fence in right-center in the fifth inning, providing the final two runs in the Angels’ 7-2 rout of Boston Wednesday night.

“I just wanted to make it special for her and show her I remember,” Parker said after the Angels extended their winning streak to four games and stayed 1 1/2 games behind the first-place Oakland Athletics.

“I’ve got some more presents for her and we’re going to celebrate later and I got some champagne. I’m trying to pass along a message. My birthday is Sunday and I want something really nice from her.”

Two runs batted in from Parker, two from Dave Winfield and two from Lance Parrish were a fine present for Kirk McCaskill, who won his fourth consecutive decision.

“I’ve been throwing the ball better and we’re just scoring a lot of runs,” he said.

McCaskill (6-5) gave up seven hits over seven innings before yielding to Bob McClure in the eighth. McClure was taken out of the game when a line drive by Mike Greenwell struck him on the right foot, and Jeff Robinson pitched the ninth inning to assure the Angels of their eighth consecutive series victory.

McClure’s bruised right foot will be examined again today.

That was the only gloomy note for the Angels, whose 30-21 record is the third best in baseball behind the Pittsburgh Pirates (33-16) and the A’s (32-20).

“We’re in sync, Lance Parrish and myself, and when we get G-man (Gary Gaetti) on track, we’re going to be awesome,” Parker said. “There’s no getting around it. The rest of the league has got something to think about. When we execute and put everything together, we’re going to put some distance between us and other people.”

Until the four-run fifth inning, the Angels weren’t able to put much distance between themselves and the Red Sox, who ended up falling 1 1/2 games behind the Toronto Blue Jays in the AL East.

The Angels had scored in the third on singles by Donnie Hill and Dick Schofield and a wild pitch by rookie right-hander Mike Gardiner (1-1), but the Red Sox came back with two in the top of the fourth.

“They hit some pretty good pitches early on in the game. It was kind of strange that way. They hit some pretty good pitches and missed some cookies later on,” said McCaskill, whose last four-game winning streak was June 16-July 25, 1988.

Parrish made it fun for McCaskill in the fourth with his two-out, two-run homer to center. His seventh homer of the season scored Winfield, who had led off the inning with a double.

“I feel good, it looks like Dave Parker is feeling a little better, a little more confident at the plate and Dave Winfield is hitting the ball well,” said Parrish, who was in a six-for-51 slump before going three for four Tuesday and one for three Wednesday.

“I’d like to see everybody on this team get hot at once. It would be a nice show, kind of like those spring games.”

Winfield enjoyed an impressive spring but languished in the .200s for much of May. As the weather has warmed up, so has he.

Winfield’s fifth-inning double scored Luis Polonia and Wally Joyner and gave him 1,556 RBIs. That moved him one ahead of Willie McCovey and into 22nd place on the all-time list. The crowd of 24,089 applauded his feat, but, to Winfield, the historic aspect was merely a footnote.

“We’re trying to win. It was a tight game, a full count, and I drove in a couple runs. That’s what I was most pleased about,” said Winfield, who likes what he sees.

“We were winning games, but we really weren’t clicking on all cylinders,” he said. “Lance and big Dave, when those guys hit, they get big hits, big long balls like Lance drove over the fence.

“We’re not going to see Oakland for a while, but I’m sure they’re watching us. We haven’t put together a long streak, but we keep winning series. When we do put together a winning streak, I don’t know what might happen.”