Every Which Way, Angels Beat Twins : Baseball: Finley wins his 103rd game as California rolls to 9-1 victory.

What a pitching staff. What a lineup. This is a team only an Angel fan could love.

The Minnesota Twins--remember those 1991 world champions?--came to Anaheim Stadium Monday night and you couldn’t even see the shadows of their former selves as the Angels rolled to a 9-1 victory in front of a paid crowd of 13,006.

Followers of Angel baseball are accustomed to watching a team that’s out of the pennant race by mid-summer, but 20 games back before Father’s Day during a season that started more than three weeks late?

Ouch.

“Yeah, it’s got all the makings of a very long year for them,” said Chuck Finley, who became the third-winningest pitcher in Angel history Monday night, picking up his 103rd victory. “We’ve been there before, but I don’t think we’ve ever been 20 games behind this early.

“They’re short on experience, but if you told me before the season they’d be this far out, I never would have believed it.”

The Twins, who have won two in a row only once this season, have lost five consecutive. But at least they’re balanced.

Starting pitching?

Baseball owners are searching for new ways to speed up the game, and the Twins may have found one in starter Eddie Guardado. When Guardado is pitching, hitters sprint from the on-deck circle to the batter’s box.

Before Monday night’s game, right-handed batters were hitting .373 against him and the Angels were quick to inflate that number. They scored twice in the first and five times in the third. Guardado gave up seven runs in 2 2/3 innings, his record fell to 0-6 and his earned-run average ballooned to 6.64.

The bullpen?

Dave Stevens, who gave up three ninth-inning homers in his last outing, yielded a two-run triple to Gary DiSarcina in the third and two singles and a Tim Salmon homer in the fourth.

Hitters?

Minnesota’s lineup features Kirby Puckett, Chuck Knoblauch and a cast of “Who the heck is that?” It includes Matt Walbeck, Rich Becker, Jeff Reboulet (rhymes with double play) and Scott Leius (rhymes with they love to play us).

The Twins managed five hits against Finley and scored a run in the sixth when Knoblauch doubled, took third on a groundout and scored when Finley bounced a forkball in the dirt.

There wasn’t much suspense after the first three innings. Tony Phillips led off the first inning with a walk, Salmon sent a one-out double down the left-field line and both scored on Chili Davis’ single to center. It was the ninth time in the last 11 games that the Angels have scored in the first inning. They’ve scored 17 first-inning runs during that span.

Guardado walked Salmon and Davis with one out in the third. J.T. Snow singled home Salmon, Davis scored on Jim Edmonds’ sacrifice fly and Fabregas lined a run-scoring single to center.

Then DiSarcina greeted Stevens with a line drive to right that skipped past Puckett and the Angels led, 7-0.

“You have to take advantage of these kinds of games when you get them,” Manager Marcel Lachemann said. “We’ve been on the other side of them, too.”

When asked about the Twins’ spot in the standings, Lachemann looked incredulous.

“Really? Twenty games out?” he asked. “It’s tough, but knowing Tom [Kelly, Twin manager], he won’t let it be a wasted season.”

After Salmon hit a two-run homer to left in the fourth, everyone seemed content to take a swing-away-and-come-what-may approach.

Even Mitch Williams, who pitched the ninth inning, couldn’t screw up this one. He walked the first two batters he faced but second baseman Rex Hudler made a spectacular diving stop to start a double play and Williams got Walbeck to pop up to end the game.