BASEBALL / ROSS NEWHAN : Opening With a Loss Exactly What Angels Didn’t Need

Seldom has a team been more in need of a fast start than the Angels.

Denigrated by media experts and picked by many to finish last again in the American League West, the Angels require a solid foundation on which to build a measure of self confidence and self respect.

They also need a fast start to help maintain the value of a franchise that owners Gene and Jackie Autry have said they may be forced to sell.

Jackie Autry recently broached that possibility while saying the Angels lost $3.6 million last year and could lose $8.5 million this year.

Gene Autry said it in even stronger terms Sunday night when he called a talk show on his radio station, KMPC, and said he was tired of losing money, tired of the complaints from players and everyone else on every issue and tired of the criticism that has been directed at his wife.

“Anyone who wants the Angels can have them,” he told Joe McDonnell, the show’s host.

The question may not be who would want the Angels, but who could afford them at a likely price of $150 million to $200 million?

The list would have to include Disney’s Michael Eisner, Denver oil man Marvin Davis, Laker owner Jerry Buss, Beverly Hills sportsman Harry Ornest (a member of Hollywood Park’s board of directors and former owner of the Montreal Alouettes and St. Louis Blues) and a possible partnership of former commissioner Peter Ueberroth (a member of the Angels board of directors) and Orange County developer George Argyros, former owner of the Seattle Mariners.

“Officially, I don’t think the Angels are for sale,” Ueberroth said Tuesday. “I haven’t asked, but as a member of their board I think I’d know. However, if they were (for sale), I’d be interested.”

Fast start? Fast sale? Tuesday night it was depreciation all around as the Angels lost their 1992 season opener to the Chicago White Sox, 10-4, at Anaheim Stadium.

The Autrys watched from their private box but refused comment on their status, telling a spokesman what they told a board meeting in Palm Springs recently: The Angels are not for sale and will be only if their financial losses continue to mount.

That’s for the accountants, who might be required to keep the ledger on Angel losses before 1992 is over.

The opener was No. 1 en route to . . . the 120 recorded by the New York Mets in 1962? Or the club record 95, registered in both 1968 and ‘80?

“We know that as a team we can finish anywhere from first to last,” Manager Buck Rodgers said. “We have more ifs than most. A fast start is relatively important for our young players so they don’t feel they have to do more than they can do.

“I’ve always felt that pressure is self inflicted, but if there’s pressure, hopefully it will stay on the veterans who can handle it.”

The ifs, however, don’t start and stop with the unproven Joe Grahe, the No. 4 starter, or the untested Lee Stevens, Bobby Rose and Gary DiSarcina, each beginning his first full season in the Angels’ infield.

The veterans will have to do more than carry some of the pressure. Von Hayes, Lance Parrish, Gary Gaetti and Hubie Brooks, in particular, will have to re-establish their careers.

Rodgers reflected on his own. He thought back to 1962, when he was the first-year catcher for the second-year Angels.

“I went 0 for 25, got a hit, then went 0 for 17, but Rig (manager Bill Rigney) kept me back there because we were winning,” Rodgers said. “If we don’t win, if we don’t get off to a decent start. . . .”

Rodgers knows the kind of questions he’ll hear, the kind of headlines he’ll read: How long does he stay with this or that kid? Is this or that veteran washed up?

On opening night, the Angels got a two-run homer from one of the veterans, Hayes, and another from one of the kids, Rose. But they also made three errors, and Mark Langston, a 19-game winner in 1991, lasted only three-plus innings, allowing 10 of the White Sox’s 14 hits and seven runs.

It was only the first of 162 games, of course, but if the Angels don’t win regularly behind Langston, Jim Abbott and Chuck Finley, the outlook is darker than it already seems, darker even than the Autry’s financial forecasts.