ANGELS : Randle, 46, Takes Gig as Replacement

He’s been a Washington Senator, a singer and a stand-up comic, and now Lenny Randle is a 46-year-old replacement player after signing a minor league contract with the Angels Saturday.

Randle, an infielder who broke into the majors with the Senators in 1971, has been playing in Italy recently. He’s also been singing and doing comedy in clubs from New York to Japan. He played with four other clubs in a major league career that ended in 1982.

He said he would be willing to play in regular-season replacement games as well as those in spring training.

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It hasn’t been easy, but Manager Marcel Lachemann has tried his best to make this spring training seem like any other. That’s why during games he still keeps a list of foul-ups and blunders on a note pad.

He hasn’t given up his method of operation simply because the names on his lineup card aren’t very familiar. Mistakes are still mistakes, he said.

“You have to play this game right, I don’t care who’s playing,” he said after a recent game. “I can accept lack of talent, but I can’t accept lack of concentration.

“When you do things wrong and let them go by, that’s when you get into bad habits. It’s our job to point mistakes out.”

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Lachemann said he would welcome interleague play when the new teams from Tampa Bay and Arizona take the field in 1998.

“I think it would be exciting,” he said. “I’d like to see it. Hopefully, we’ll have done enough goodwill by then to patch up any bad feelings (on the part of the fans from the strike).”

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Notes

The heavy rains that hit California moved into the Phoenix area Saturday morning, forcing cancellation of the Angels’ game against the San Diego Padres. The Angels also announced the cancellation of a split-squad game against the San Francisco Giants on March 19. . . . Picture day is set for March 20. No word on what happens to the pictures once the strike is settled.