BASEBALL DAILY REPORT : ANGELS : With New Faces, Edmonds Is Out

Jim Edmonds couldn’t wait. This was going to be his year.

He figured he had nothing left to prove in triple A, having batted .315 last season for Vancouver. There was no doubt in his mind he could do the same in the big leagues, predicting that one day he could win a batting title.

“I planned all winter on being be at least the fourth outfielder,” Edmonds said before the Angels’ 9-2 loss Monday to the Colorado Rockies at Tucson. “I figured I finally was going to be in the big leagues.”

Edmonds’ world came crashing down on Jan. 31, the day the Angels signed Bo Jackson and Dwight Smith.

“When they got Bo, it discouraged me,” Edmonds said. “But when they signed Dwight Smith, that really got me down. . . . They didn’t sign those guys for no reason. I know they’re not going anywhere, so that leaves me out.”

Edmonds, 23, met with General Manager Bill Bavasi, asking for reassurance that he wouldn’t be buried in the organization.

“I was up front with him,” Bavasi said. “I told him, ‘Hey, I know this isn’t good for you, but don’t let yourself be buried.’ ”

Said Edmonds: “I still don’t know quite what to expect, but I’ve learned that things can change pretty quickly in this game. Now, it’s up to me to force some more changes.”

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Pete Janicki last pitched in a game 11 months ago, but he reminded the Angels that it would be foolish for anyone to give up on him.

Janicki pitched two perfect innings without a a ball leaving the infield in the Angels’ finest pitching performance of the spring.

“I don’t know what they have planned for me, but everything’s going the way I hoped,” Janicki said. “I don’t have very high expectations, I just want to pitch the whole season this time.”

Janicki, the club’s first-round pick in 1982, suffered a broken right elbow last April 12 in his first appearance at Class A Palm Springs and sat out the entire season.

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Russ Springer gave up seven hits and seven earned runs in his spring-training debut. “We’re not going to give up on Russ Springer, but he’s got to get control of his pitches,” Manager Buck Rodgers said. “It boils down to the same old thing with him, consistency.” . . . What does Rodgers think about his pitching staff, which has a 9.00 ERA in the first four games? “If we were to break camp tomorrow, it would be a real (chore) trying to come up with 10 pitchers. Our pitching has been pretty bad.”

Center fielder Chad Curtis forgot to take his jersey on the trip, and wound up wearing coach Sam Suplizio’s No. 52. “I told him he was taking his life in his own hands,” Suplizio said, “I might have some enemies he doesn’t know about.” . . . Left fielder Eduardo Perez, who underwent arthroscopic surgery on his right elbow in October, was scratched from the lineup because of tightness in his elbow. . . . Second baseman Kevin Flora skipped the trip because of a strained right thigh muscle and infielder Spike Owen has a sore arm that is expected to sideline him today.