Another Angel Pitcher Struggles

The Angels last winter shelled out $18 million over four years to retain pitcher Chuck Finley, but the left-hander will be the first to admit the team is not getting its money’s worth.

Finley’s slump went into its sixth week Wednesday night when the Texas Rangers roughed him up during a 7-3 victory before 44,220 at the Ballpark in Arlington, dropping the Angels 10 1/2 games behind the Rangers in the American League West.

Finley, a surprise selection to the American League All-Star team, gave up seven runs--six earned--and six hits in 6 1/3 innings and tied a career high with six walks.

He has not won a game since June 18, and the statistics for his last nine starts are staggering: a 2-6 record and 7.52 earned-run average.

“I can’t remember having this much trouble for this amount of time,” said Finley, who is 57-56 since the start of the 1992 season. “It’s a bad feeling going out and letting my teammates down. That’s what really hurts.”

Finley (9-8) is the Angel ace, the pitcher who is expected to set the tone for the rest of the staff. “He knows what his responsibility on the club is, how important it is for him to pitch well,” Manager Marcel Lachemann said. “That goes with the territory when you’re making the big cash.”

But Finley’s struggles have merely mirrored those of Angels starters, who in the last 18 games have combined for a 3-8 record, 8.75 ERA and 108 walks, an average of six a game.

The Angels are 5-13 in those games, all against division opponents, and with 67 games remaining this season they have virtually walked right out of pennant contention.

“Bases on balls are killing us,” Lachemann said. “How many did we walk tonight, seven? You can’t do that. Chuck’s stuff is fine, his velocity is fine. They’re going to get their hits, but you can’t put guys on base. I mean, we outhit them, 11-8, and we lose, 7-3?”

Hard to imagine, but with the way the Angels are hitting and pitching, this has become routine. As they have several times this past week, the Angels had chances for big early innings but couldn’t come up with much in the clutch.

They had the bases loaded with one out after scoring once in the first inning, but Ranger starter and winner Ken Hill (10-5) struck out Garret Anderson and George Arias.

After Anderson’s RBI single in the third inning, the Angels had two on and one out, but Arias hit into a double play. The Angels didn’t score again until the ninth, when reliever Ed Vosberg balked a run in.

“We’ve had chances to put teams away early and haven’t,” Lachemann said. “You don’t know how many of those chances you’re going to get.”

Finley gets a chance every fifth day to break out of his slump, but he ran into immediate trouble in the first inning Wednesday. With Mark McLemore on second and first base open with two out, he left a fastball up and over the plate to cleanup batter Juan Gonzalez, who lined it into the right-center field bleachers for his 24th home run of the season and a 2-0 lead.

Mickey Tettleton then struck out to end the inning, and the question arose: Should Finley have pitched around Gonzalez? Lachemann’s answer left no doubts.

“If you’re pitching around a guy in the first inning,” he said, “you might as well pack it up and go home.”

The Rangers’ third-inning run, which gave them a 3-2 lead, came after Finley walked the No. 9 hitter, Kevin Elster. Elster took second on a passed ball, third on Ivan Rodriguez’s bloop single and scored on Rusty Greer’s sacrifice fly.

Greer reached on an infield single with two out in the fifth and scored on Gonzalez’s RBI double for a 4-2 lead. Dean Palmer’s bases-empty homer to right in the sixth made it 5-2, and three consecutive walks by Finley in the seventh inning led to two Ranger runs.

“You can’t do that in the American League or you’ll get hurt,” said Finley, who made 132 pitches--72 strikes and 60 balls. “It’s inexcusable. You can’t win games when you put too many guys on.

“Whether you’re the ace or not, you’re responsible for doing your job. I know what to expect of myself and I know I’m not getting it done. There’s no consistency. That’s the thing that ticks me off, because I work my butt off trying to find a solution but fall into the same trap. This is not good.”