BASEBALL / DAILY REPORT : ANGELS : Hudler Continues Red-Hot Play

When Manager Marcel Lachemann inserted Rex Hudler into the starting lineup last Wednesday at Seattle, he said he was hoping the peripatetic second baseman “could provide a spark.” What he got was a brush fire.

In four games against Oakland, Hudler went 10 for 15 with two doubles, a home run, four runs, three stolen bases and three RBIs, and made a nice catch of Mark McGwire’s eighth-inning popup with two runners on Sunday.

Hudler, who has 12 stolen bases in 12 attempts this season, also provided some blooper-reel material, knocking down Oakland catcher Terry Steinbach and upending plate umpire Rich Garcia on the same play, when he was thrown out at home in the fourth inning.

“You never know what to expect from Rex,” right fielder Tim Salmon said. “Like that popup. I didn’t think he was in position to make the catch, but that’s Hud--he surprises you. He goes as fast as he can and plays with reckless abandon, and when you see that, it inspires you.”

Hudler was so pumped after the game, he seemed to relish the unenviable task of facing Seattle left-hander Randy Johnson, the American League’s best pitcher, in today’s one-game playoff to determine the division winner.

“Bring on the Big Unit,” Hudler said. “He’s a great pitcher, but we’re a great team.”

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Angel shortstop Gary DiSarcina, who grew up in Bellerica, Mass., has vivid memories of the one-game playoff game between Boston and New York in 1978, a game the Yankees won, 5-4, in Fenway Park.

“I remember skipping school and seeing Bucky Dent choke up and hit that homer and Yaz popping up to end the game,” said DiSarcina, then a fifth-grader at Ditson Elementary School. “I think everyone stayed home from school that day.”

Today’s game will be only the third one-game playoff since divisional play began in 1969, and the visiting team (New York in 1978 and Houston over Los Angeles in 1980) has won both games.

“We were more nervous having the home game than the Yankees were,” recalled Angel third-base coach Rick Burleson, the Red Sox shortstop in 1978. “They had a veteran team and Ron Guidry pitching and seemed more loose than we were.”

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If the Angels defeat the Mariners today, Jim Abbott would start Game 1 of the American League divisional series against the Yankees in New York Tuesday night. An Angel victory today would also mean the Angels would face, in three consecutive days, probable 1995 Cy Young Award winner Randy Johnson, 1994 Cy Young winner David Cone and 1993 Cy Young winner Jack McDowell.

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The 1995 Angels became the first team since 1982 to score 800 runs in a season but fell well short of the single-season record of 866, set in 1979.

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Three Angels--Edmonds (104), Tim Salmon (103) and J.T. Snow (101)--have 100 or more RBIs this season, marking only the second time in club history that that feat has been accomplished. Don Baylor (139), Dan Ford (101) and Bobby Grich (101) were the last Angel trio with at least 100 RBIs in the same season, 1979.

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Salmon’s RBI single in the third inning Sunday gave him 316 total bases, moving him past Doug DeCinces and into second place on the Angels’ all-time single-season total bases list.