Angels Use Some Muscle, but Mistakes Cost Them : Baseball: Snow, Salmon and Davis homer off Wakefield, but Boston wins it in the 10th, 6-5.

Through Aug. 15, the Angels had lost three consecutive games only once this season. With a 6-5 loss to the Boston Red Sox before a paid crowd of 29,053 in Anaheim Stadium on Wednesday night, the Angels have two three-game skids in the past eight days.

Tim Naehring singled off reliever Lee Smith (0-5) to open the 10th inning, and Mike Greenwell tripled him home, as Boston surged to its 19th victory in the last 21 games and continued to run away from the rest of the American League East.

Rick Aguilera pitched the 10th for his 24th save.

Meanwhile, an Angel lead that swelled to 11 games in early August shrunk to 7 1/2 games because of Texas’ victory over Minnesota, and suddenly a team that appeared to be a lock for its first division title since 1986 can no longer find the right combinations.

For the second consecutive night the Angels ran into an out on the basepaths, and it cost them a run. An error led to an unearned Boston run in the first inning, and another error aided Boston during a two-run fifth inning.

In the 10th, right fielder Tim Salmon picked up, then dropped, Greenwell’s hit into the corner, giving him no chance to make a play on Naehring, who scored from first.

The Angels had used the long ball to overcome two deficits and some sharp relief pitching to preserve a 5-5 tie through nine.

The Red Sox loaded the bases in the sixth on three walks by Angel starter Jim Abbott. But Angel Manager Marcel Lachemann went to right-handed reliever Mike James, who struck out Willie McGee and got John Valentin to pop to first to end the inning.

James pitched a scoreless seventh inning, and Troy Percival struck out two of three batters he faced in the eighth. Percival also retired the side in the ninth before giving way to Smith to start the 10th.

The Angels had runners on second and third with two out in the eighth, but Boston reliever Mike Stanton (1-0) struck out J.T. Snow to end the inning. Stanton then struck out two of three in the ninth to send the game into extra innings.

Boston had snapped a 3-3 tie with two runs in the fifth, as Chris James doubled and scored on Luis Alicea’s single to right. Alicea took second when Salmon’s throw got by catcher Jorge Fabregas, and he scored when Valentin dumped a single into center field.

But the Angels bounced back with two in the bottom of the fifth on back-to-back home runs by Salmon and Chili Davis, the switch-hitter who was batting right-handed against right-handed knuckleballer Tim Wakefield.

Snow, who homered in the third inning, almost made it three in a row when he drove a pitch to deep left field, but Greenwell made a leaping grab about a foot above the fence, robbing Snow of a home run.

In what must be an alarming trend to Lachemann, the Angels had another rocky first inning Wednesday night, as Abbott surrendered three runs, two on Jose Canseco’s home run to left field. The Angels have given up two or more runs in the first inning in five of their past six games.

Canseco, hampered by numerous injuries early in the season, has been on a tear the past nine days, going 17 for 36 (.472) with five homers and 11 runs batted in to raise his average from .288 to .313.

The Red Sox designated hitter has a .385 career average (10 for 26) with three homers against Abbott. He also ended Abbott’s string of 55 consecutive innings without giving up a homer, dating back to July 7.

Boston scored earlier in the first when Valentin reached on third baseman Tony Phillips’ fielding error, stole second and came home on Mo Vaughn’s single to center.

Wakefield had the Angels baffled during the first two innings, but the Angels caught up to a few knuckleballs, got in the way of another, and took advantage of a few rare fastballs to score three in the third inning--Davis (run-scoring single) and Snow (two-run homer) doing the honors.