Helpful Angels Provide Boucher’s First Victory : Baseball: Rookie left-hander needed 11 starts before winning a major league game.

The name is Denis Boucher. The s and the r are silent. Even quieter, that is, than the Angel offense of late.

He is a French-Canadian, a young man who inspired some fans behind the Cleveland dugout to wave the flag of Quebec on Saturday night in Anaheim Stadium. Already he has drawn the eye of a Montreal Expos scout, as the Expos dream of the number of fans who would throng to Olympic Stadium to see one of their own pitch.

Until Saturday, Boucher was still dreaming of his first major league victory. The Angels helped him with that Saturday, as Boucher shut them out through seven innings, leaving with two out in the eighth after allowing five hits and one run.

With the victory, he is 1-6.

“This was my 11th start of the year up in the big leagues. It took a while,” Boucher said. “It’s a big relief right now.

“It helped my confidence. I was getting frustrated a lot. I hope No. 2 is coming in the next five days.”

He is not an overpowering pitcher, nor a strikeout artist. On Saturday, the left-hander retired the Angels on a steady stream of ground balls to the third, short and second.

“He’s that type of pitcher,” Cleveland Manager Mike Hargrove said. “People have to make the plays behind him.”

Boucher came to the Indians on June 27 in the trade that sent pitcher Tom Candiotti to Toronto for outfielders Glenallen Hill and Mark Whiten, both Indian starters now.

Hill walked three times Saturday, and scored two of Cleveland’s runs in a 4-1 victory. Whiten was 0 for 4, but had hit in seven consecutive games. Since joining the Indians, he is hitting .316 with three homers and 12 runs batted in.

Candiotti is leading the American League in earned-run average, but he will become a free agent, and would be too expensive for Cleveland, which is in a full-fledged youth movement.

Boucher was a throw-in in the trade.

“His first time out, John McNamara was still the manager,” Hargrove recalled. “The first thought that crossed my mind was that this kid was overmatched. Every time since he’s been better and better.”

But he had not gotten a victory. The way the Angels have been hitting lately, even Saturday’s triumph was dubious.

“Tonight he threw good enough to make us look pretty bad,” Angel Dave Gallagher said.

In his most-recent outing, against Oakland, Boucher had thrown about the same as he did Saturday, Hargrove said.

He lasted 3 1/3 innings, giving up five runs and 10 hits.

Ron Tingley, the Angel catcher, considered how Boucher might have fared against an Angel offense hitting on all cylinders.

“He might throw the same thing, and not last two innings,” Tingley said.

To Boucher, it didn’t matter. Nor to the Indians.