Carter Might Be Their Most Painful Loss : AL Game 3: Blue Jay outfielder suffers sprained ankle when spikes catch on the padding of wall.

A consecutive game playing streak of 505 pales compared to Cal Ripken’s 1,573, but it is baseball’s second longest and a measure of Joe Carter’s value in an era of bulging disabled lists.

Carter has not missed a regular-season game since 1988. He plays whether it is Cleveland, San Diego or Toronto, but he might not be able to play in Game 4 of the American League’s championship series tonight.

It was difficult to determine which was more painful for the Blue Jays Friday night:

--A 3-2 loss to the Minnesota Twins in which they left 10 runners on base in 10 innings of Game 3 or the possible loss of Carter, their leading run producer, with a sprained right ankle suffered when his spikes caught in the padding of the right-field fence.

“I thought it was broken, and if I hadn’t been wearing my high tops, it probably would have been,” Carter said long after the Twins took a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven series.

Carter limped to his locker after receiving treatment behind the closed doors of the trainer’s room and said:

“This injury is not going to keep me down. The chances are very good I’ll be able to play tomorrow night.”

But he added:

“It’s tough. It’s badly sprained. It’s really painful. My hope rests with the fact that I’m a quick healer. Maybe I’ll get a miracle overnight.”

Carter hit 33 home runs during the regular season and drove in 108, becoming the first player in baseball history to drive in 100 or more runs in three seasons for three teams. He had three hits in seven at-bats in the first two games of the playoff and auspiciously returned to the SkyDome Friday night by hitting a first-inning home run against Scott Erickson to dead center field.

“He’s the heart and soul of the middle of our lineup,” Candy Maldonado said. “Everyone knows what he’s done the last six or seven years. His presence means a lot. Right now it doesn’t look good, but all we can do is try to pick him up if he can’t play.”

The injury occurred as Carter pursued Shane Mack’s slicing drive to the opposite field as the leadoff batter in the fifth.

“You can’t think about the angle at which you’re going to hit the fence,” Carter said later. “You can’t try to change your style. You just have to go for it.”

As Carter went up, his right spikes caught. He reached up, had the ball in his glove, but said the pain was so instantaneously severe that his hand went numb and he was unable to close his glove around the ball.

“I haven’t felt that much pain in a long time,” he said.

The ball bounced free. Carter limped after it and was able to return it to the infield as Mack reached third with a triple and Carter fell to the ground.

Trainer Tom Craig raced out, gave Carter some field tests and found there was no break.

“Joe’s tough,” Craig said. “I asked him if he wanted to come out and he said, ‘No, I want to get up.’

“He jumped on it, jogged a little and decided he wanted to stay in.”

Said Carter: “I wanted one or two more at-bats. I wanted to contribute. I wanted to help us win.”

He struck out in the bottom of the fifth, however, and was walked intentionally with a runner at second and one out in the seventh, prompting manager Cito Gaston to send in a pinch-runner.

“By then,” Carter said, “it had stiffened up again and was hurting. I was no good after that.”

Carter said he would probably remain at the SkyDome through most of the night, receiving additional treatment, and would be X-rayed this morning if there was no improvement.

He said, at worst, he hoped to be able to serve as a designated hitter tonight.