Indians Bounce Angels : Baseball: Three grounders get through infield for hits against Eichhorn to give Cleveland 3-2 victory.

His objective was to keep the ball down so the Cleveland Indians would hit it on the ground, and to that end, Mark Eichhorn succeeded.

Carlos Baerga, Albert Belle and Paul Sorrento obliged him, but Eichhorn’s plan went awry when all three grounders bounced through the right side of the Angels’ infield with two out in the eighth inning, giving the Indians a 3-2 victory Saturday before 6,544 at Cleveland Stadium.

“Any time I go out there, I’ll take those ground balls, any day,” Eichhorn (0-1) said. “Those three balls were all hit where nobody was. It makes it a little more frustrating, a little harder to take.”

After Baerga poked a grounder between first and second, Belle hit Eichhorn’s first pitch through the same hole, moving Baerga to third. That brought up former Angel farmhand Sorrento, who also found a spot beyond the reach of first baseman Rene Gonzales.

“There wasn’t one hard-hit ball in that inning,” Manager Buck Rodgers said after his team’s seventh loss in nine one-run decisions. “Three dribblers through the right side and we lose the game. . . .

“We’re not in a panic situation, this early in May, but we’ve got to even that thing out. We’ve got to win more one-run games than we lose if we’re going to be a good club, and right now we’re not at that point.”

He thought the Angels were at the point of routing former Dodger Dennis Cook when they scored a run in the fourth to take a 2-1 lead.

“I didn’t think he was going to last five,” Rodgers said, “but they made some big defensive plays and we didn’t execute on some of the chances we had.”

The Indians scored a run off Julio Valera in the first when Kenny Lofton beat out a bunt, stole second, moved to third on a grounder and came home on Belle’s single to right. The Angels matched that in the second inning, when Mike Fitzgerald slammed a 2-and-2 pitch over the left-field fence for his second homer in two games.

The Angels inched ahead in the fourth on a single by Junior Felix, a ground out and Gary Gaetti’s RBI single to left. Gaetti took second on the throw home and tried to score on Fitzgerald’s single to center, but was thrown out on an outstanding relay by second baseman Baerga.

“Because of the trajectory, I thought it might be caught, so I looked back and took off again,” Gaetti said. “As I came around third, I slipped. It was kind of a weird play all around.”

The Indians tied the game in the bottom of the inning on a single, a walk, a ground out and a passed ball charged to Fitzgerald.

“Most of the time his forkball goes away from lefties or down,” Fitzgerald said. “I was setting up on the outside corner and it went inside. It was a tough ball to catch, but I should have caught it.”

By contrast, the Indians made a number of spectacular catches. Left fielder Thomas Howard made a diving catch on Hubie Brooks’ sinking liner to end the sixth. Right fielder Mark Whiten caught Fitzgerald’s hit-and-run liner and threw to first to double off Gaetti, who walked in the seventh.

“I just hit it too hard,” Fitzgerald said. “I just killed it. It was a low liner that carried too far.”

Scott Bailes kept the Angels in contention in the bottom of the sixth, escaping a bases-loaded, no-out jam by throwing a called third strike past Bell and getting a pair of force plays.

The Angels had similar luck against Ted Power and Derek Lilliquist (1-0) in the eighth. Bobby Rose led off with a single, but Gary DiSarcina popped up a bunt. Luis Polonia moved Rose to second with a grounder to short and Rose took third when third baseman Craig Worthington bobbled Chad Curtis’ grounder, but Lilliquist got Felix on a called third strike.

“The guys are playing hard and hustling, and if we continue to do the little things well we’re going to win more one-run games than we lose,” Fitzgerald said. “(Cook) pitched very well, and when we did get runners on, they got some double plays. I think if we keep doing what we’ve been doing, things will start going the other way.”

* DARRYL STRAWBERRY

The Dodger outfielder is torn between the anger of rioters and the wounding of his brother, a Los Angeles police officer. C9