Communications Gaffe Costly to Angels : Baseball: Royals’ McRae gets inside-the-park homer when Ducey and Felix collide in outfield.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — This time, the Angels’ gaffe in the outfield had nothing to do with stadium lights or bizarre bounces off the artificial turf.

It could only be blamed on left fielder Rob Ducey and center fielder Junior Felix, who raced hard toward Brian McRae’s fly ball Thursday afternoon, both yelling, neither yielding.

The result was a collision and one of baseball’s most buffoonish plays, an inside-the-park home run after two outfielders tried to catch one ball in two gloves.

“That shouldn’t happen in the big leagues,” said interim Manager John Wathan, whose team lost to Kansas City, 7-6, before 22,553 at Royals Stadium. “That’s not a pretty play.”

It was the Royals’ second three-run, inside-the-park homer against the Angels in the last three games--all Angel losses.

The other came in the second game of Tuesday night’s doubleheader when left fielder Chad Curtis lost David Howard’s line drive in the lights and the runners circled the bases as the ball rolled to the wall.

After Thursday’s fourth-inning collision--scored as a home run for McRae, a decision Wathan criticized--the Angels came back in the fifth with five runs on five consecutive hits and a sacrifice fly.

Royal catcher Mike Macfarlane won the game in the eighth inning by breaking a 6-6 tie with a homer against loser Chuck Crim (6-4).

Juan Berenguer (1-1) earned the victory in relief, and Jeff Montgomery recorded his 27th save in 30 opportunities.

“That was a tough one to lose, especially with the comeback, when we put five runs up the next inning,” Wathan said.

Chuck Finley, the Angel starter, found it particularly tough. He was charged with six earned runs, including three on the collision-aided homer and two on George Brett’s two-run triple in the fifth inning on a ball to the left-field corner that Ducey had trouble with as it bounced back over his head.

Finley found it difficult to concede McRae’s homer.

“Three-run error,” Finley said, pointedly. “Santa Claus was up there working the official book.”

Ducey and Felix--who became teammates last week when Ducey was traded from Toronto--are the only people who know what happened on McRae’s fly ball to the gap in left-center.

“I’m assuming they didn’t hear each other,” Wathan said. “In that situation, you’d better be screaming loud.”

Ducey, whose glove touched the ball about the time he and Felix collided, knocking both to the ground, said he called for the ball. But he said that by the time he heard Felix call, too, it was too late for him to stop.

“It should have been an out,” Ducey said. “If he had called for it sooner, I might have been able to back away.”

Felix said he heard Ducey call for the ball, but as the center fielder, his own call should have taken precedence.

“We were both calling it. We both came in too quick, but I did call the ball,” Felix said. “He’s got to go. I’ve got . . . more power than him. I’m the center fielder. When the center fielder calls the ball, he’s got to get out of the way.”

Wathan, who said he will address the two about the play today, said Felix’s call should take precedence, but said if he were scoring, he would have given Felix an error.

“I think you have to give it to Junior because the ball was in Ducey’s glove,” Wathan said. “(But) the center fielder is usually the guy that makes the call. (If Felix called it), Ducey should have let Junior take the ball. The center fielder has got to be the quarterback.

“If he called loud enough for Ducey to hear, Ducey has got to give way.”

For Ducey, it was a rough day all around. He had one hit in 21 at-bats all season with Toronto and is hitless in five at-bats with the Angels.

The heat, bounces and collision combined to make Thursday a long afternoon for him.

“It wasn’t one of my best days,” Ducey said. “That ball that Brett hit was foul. (Third base umpire) Larry Barnett said it hit the yellow (foul line on the wall, making it fair). Then Gary Thurman hit one over my head to the wall, and it bounced back and hit my hand, hit my glove, hit everything.”

Ducey was charged with an error, allowing Thurman to take third after his double.