Angels Defeat Helpful Twins : Baseball: Minnesota errors make 9-3 victory much easier.

With their role as foils for Cal Ripken Jr.’s streak history, the Angels returned to Anaheim Stadium to again focus on winning the American League West.

Perhaps the arrival of the Minnesota Twins, with the worst record in the major leagues, signaled the worst is over.

Three Minnesota errors led to four unearned runs in the sixth inning and helped the Angels to a 9-3 victory Friday night before an announced crowd of 21,738.

The Angels came close to resembling the club that seemed bent on running away with the division title only a month ago. They got runners on base, moved them along and built their largest lead since Aug. 20.

Tony Phillips led off the Angel first inning with a solo homer and J.T. Snow hit his 20th homer, a two-run shot in the seventh. The Angels sent nine batters to the plate in the sixth, turning a 2-2 game into a runaway.

Left-hander Mark Langston went seven strong innings, giving up three bases-empty home runs, but only one other hit, and struck out seven.

Langston (14-4) had lost his last two starts, failing to go past six innings each time.

The Angels’ attention seemed to stray in Baltimore as Ripken first tied, then broke Lou Gehrig’s streak of 2,130 consecutive games played. However, the Angels had lost their way long before hitting Camden Yards.

Losers of 17 of 21 games before Friday, the Angels were coming off a 1-8 trip to New York, Boston and Baltimore. True, they had lost only 4 1/2 games in the standings and still led second-place Seattle by six games.

But staggering to the finish wasn’t what General Manager Bill Bavasi had in mind for the Angels.

“There’s no excuse for what’s happening right now,” Bavasi said before Friday’s game. “We took a 10-game lead, lost our focus and fell apart through a lack of concentration and effort.”

Phillips took that notion to heart, hitting balls off a tee at Anaheim Stadium for 90 minutes on the Angels’ day off on Thursday.

“I don’t enjoy embarrassing myself,” said Phillips, batting .197 since July 30.

Phillips’ homer only pulled the Angels even with the Twins because Chuck Knoblauch led off the game with a home run into the Angel bullpen in left field. It marked the 28th consecutive game the Angels have trailed at some point.

That the Angels haven’t lost more ground in the standings isn’t comforting to Bavasi, however.

“We have to get back to a point where we’re taking it pitch by pitch like we did through most of the season,” he said. “We have to do all the little things that reduce the games to pure physical ability. We have to beat people or get beat on physical talent. We can’t continue to play bad baseball.

“Hitting comes and goes and I think ours will come again, but the pitching and defense have to be more consistent.

“All I care about it how we play and execute. Now is the time to turn ourselves around.”

The Angels went to a four-man rotation starting Friday in hopes of avoiding a total collapse, with Langston facing the Twins to start the nine-game home stand.

Tonight, it’s Chuck Finley’s turn, followed by Jim Abbott and Shawn Boskie. Brian Anderson, 0-6 with a 10.86 earned-run average in his past seven starts, is the odd man out.

“They just told me to report to the bullpen,” Anderson said. “It’s a huge letdown.

” What was I going to tell him [Manager Marcel Lachemann]? ‘C’mon Lach, I almost got out of the second inning’ ?”