BASEBALL / ROSS NEWHAN : Anderson Has Detroit Retreads Treading on AL East

Former Angel Manager Buck Rodgers got into trouble with his bosses when he kept referring to his patchwork staff of released pitchers.

Rodgers would be right at home with the Detroit Tigers, a haven for released and retired ballplayers.

“We’ve had so few players come out of our system that we’ve had to keep going outside for castoffs and bad boys, and they’ve been very productive for us,” Manager Sparky Anderson said last week at Anaheim Stadium. “We’ve had very good luck with them.”

The Tigers, like some of their players, have suddenly come back from the dead in the American League East. Necessity may be the mother of invention, but credit Anderson for establishing roles and nursing contributions from the likes of Junior Felix, Juan Samuel, Kirk Gibson and Eric Davis.

“Sparky likes characters and thinks he can change people by putting them in the right environment,” said the grizzled Gibson, who re-established his career in 1993 after a year in retirement. “We all think he’s nuts, but that’s a compliment. The roles are well defined, and the guys accept and respond to them.”

With Milt Cuyler, Danny Bautista and Davis all on the disabled list, Gibson and Samuel are currently platooning in a hold-your-breath center field, but the Tigers had won 10 of 13 games through Friday to move within 4 1/2 games of the division lead and within 2 1/2 of a potential wild-card berth in the AL playoffs.

After being 12 games out on Memorial Day weekend--their biggest May deficit since 1958--and last in their division every day in April and May, the Tigers are now “sitting in a pretty good position,” Anderson said.

“Even if we hang around where we are until the All-Star break, we can give these guys a threat,” Anderson said of his division rivals. “I didn’t always feel that way.”

The Tigers still do it with the hammer. They scored seven or more runs in six of the first nine games of June and had hit at least one home run in 17 consecutive games through Friday. A labor stoppage might do what opposing pitchers are having trouble doing, but it won’t stop the accompanying comeback by what had been a long-dormant farm system.

Chris Gomez, 22, two years out of Long Beach State, has replaced Alan Trammell at shortstop, where he plays next to 25-year-old third baseman Travis Fryman. Anderson had turned center field over to the 22-year-old Bautista--”By 1997, people will be talking about him in the same way they’re now talking about the kid (Raul Mondesi) with the Dodgers,” Anderson said--until Bautista broke a hand Tuesday. Veteran Bill Krueger was released to make room for Phil Stidham, 25, in the Detroit bullpen, and Greg Gohr, 26, joined the rotation this week and could make Bill Gullickson, 35, expendable.

The league’s oldest team at the start of the season is getting younger and seemingly stronger.

“We’re on our way back,” Anderson said. “We continue to add, sometimes by subtraction. You’ve got to start the process at some point.

“It’ll take time, because it’ll be piece by piece, but by 1997 this will be a very fine franchise, which is not to say we can’t win before that. I think our bullpen is stronger than New York’s, Boston’s or Baltimore’s. If we can get some pitching up front, we’ll be tough the rest of the way.”

One thing is certain about the Tigers: The manager can tell it like it is without worrying about losing his job.

STRAWBERRY UPDATE

The San Francisco Giants seem to remain the most persistent, but the Montreal Expos are the latest team to express public interest in Darryl Strawberry. “We can offer him everything except a lot of money,” General Manager Kevin Malone said, referring to the Strawberry criteria as expressed by agent Eric Goldschmidt: A team with a chance to win playing out of a smaller market where there’s less pressure.

“As certain as one can be in a situation of this type, I’m certain Darryl will play this year and certain he’s not that far away,” Goldschmidt said. “I wouldn’t say it will be next week, but my indications are from Darryl that he’s pretty close to completing his program.

“He’s asked me to check his options, respond to the interest and bring it back to him for consideration. He’s working out every day and swinging the bat, but he understands that he’ll have to go out and play (on a minor league assignment) first. That’s not an issue.”

The Giants’ acknowledged interest in Strawberry, stemming primarily from Manager Dusty Baker’s longtime friendship and the inconsistency of an offense that was the National League’s best last year, was heightened Tuesday by the loss of Willie McGee, who tore an Achilles’ tendon and is out for the season. McGee, 35, faces a tough rehabilitation process and could be through as a Giant since he is in the final year of his contract.

The Giants will use a platoon of Dave Martinez and Mark Carreon to replace McGee, but have also recalled Amsterdam native Rikkert Faneyte from Phoenix, where he was batting .370. General Manager Bob Quinn said he would not give daily updates on the Strawberry situation.

“There’s no sense talking about it until Goldschmidt tells me Darryl is ready,” Quinn said. “You can’t rush somebody else’s rehab program just to accommodate yours.”

Meanwhile, the San Francisco firm of Bonds & Bonds strongly endorses the acquisition of Strawberry.

Bobby Bonds, the club’s hitting instructor, delivered a needle at Tom Lasorda, the Dodger manager who had characterized Strawberry’s addiction as a weakness rather than a disease, saying: “Anyone would be crazy to say they don’t want a Darryl Strawberry, regardless if this had happened or not. He has a lot of talent and can still play the game. Put him with the right team that understands his problem--and it is a problem, despite what his ex-manager says--and if he works on his program to the fullest, he can be a productive player again.”

Said his son, left fielder Barry Bonds: “He’d be around the right people--Dusty, my father. They’d know how to keep him in line. He’d be around people who care about him. If he needs a baby-sitter, I’m it.”

Whiten trade now?), Dennis Martinez, Jack Morris and Charles Nagy are a combined 14-1 since May 13 and all on a pace to pitch 200 innings, a Cleveland first since Bob Lemon, Early Wynn, Herb Score and Mike Garcia did it in 1955.

* DETENTE: Baltimore Oriole Manager John Oates, on a hot seat and believing that someone in the front office has been cutting him up, and club Vice President Frank Robinson, who acknowledges that he would like to manage again, had a meeting Tuesday that produced only smiles--for the time being.

“Frank Robinson is a lot more secure and a lot stronger in the game than to have to undermine or back-stab to get someone’s job,” Oates said. “He’s done too much in the game above the table to have to do anything under the table. I have no problem with Frank saying he would manage again.”

* THE RETIRING TYPE? John Kruk will play on an every-other-day basis until he has recovered from arthroscopic knee surgery. In the meantime, the Philadelphia Phillies’ first baseman said the draining effect of that surgery, following his radiation treatment and surgery for testicular cancer, led briefly to thoughts of retirement. “Then I realized that (life) is just paying me back,” he said. “I must have had too much fun last year (when the Phillies won the National League pennant). There has to be a give-and-take to everything.”

SLUGGER UPDATE

The Cincinnati Reds brought in Ron Gant for a physical examination, but it seemed to be a publicity stunt since Gant, still recovering from the broken leg suffered in an off-season motorcycle accident that resulted in his release by the Atlanta Braves, can’t run yet. There would seem to be no place for him in the Reds’ outfield of Deion Sanders, Reggie Sanders and Kevin Mitchell, unless Mitchell, in the last year of his contract, is traded.

Speculation now is that Gant, taking batting practice but running only in a therapy pool, won’t be ready until next year, but agent Goldschmidt said: “Some clubs are just trying to psych other clubs out by saying that. Anyone who has seen Ronnie or talked to Dr. (Joseph) Chandler knows he’ll be playing this year.”

Perhaps, but both Gant and Strawberry face the possibility of a prolonged work stoppage and the reluctance of clubs to make a significant financial commitment while unsure of how many games will be played after the July 11-13 All-Star break.

Meanwhile, Mitchell, despite his 50-homer pace, hasn’t endeared himself to Davey Johnson recently. Mitchell was involved in a Cincinnati area bar fracas Friday night and questioned Johnson’s thinking when the manager questioned his team’s intensity in the early innings of games and suggested that the clubhouse stereo might have to be shut off. “Maybe we’re still doing the rumba and boogaloo (in those early innings),” Johnson said.

Mitchell commented: “Why’s he complaining? What’s he talking about as long as you get a win? I thought laid back meant sitting in the lounge chair in the sand and sun with a drink in your hand being fanned by girls in bikinis. Cut the music off if that’s what he wants to do, but then he’ll really wonder about the intensity. Then he’ll really have laid-back people because it’ll be dead in the clubhouse.”

BULLPEN MESS

Which came first, the Dodgers’ inconsistent relief pitching or the undefined roles? It’s a combustible situation fueled by internal sniping and second-guessing, some even by Lasorda’s de facto godson, Mike Piazza. The manager, of course, is not to blame for Darren Dreifort’s inexperience and Todd Worrell’s early-season injury and unreliable performances, but he’s the man responsible for sorting it out.

The most pressing concern is the talented Dreifort. He might resist it, but the Dodgers need to get him into a more relaxed classroom before they damage his arm, mind or both. He wouldn’t say it publicly, but the rookie is now telling friends and teammates that he is concerned about his use--in and out of games, up and down in the bullpen. Unfortunately, with Jim Gott going on the disabled list and Worrell and Lasorda obviously on different wavelengths, there probably will be no relief for Dreifort and little for a team clearly missing the reliability of Pedro Martinez and established roles.