Time Is Short, So Angels Win

The Angels entered Friday’s game against the Seattle Mariners with a 10 1/2-game deficit in the American League West, but shortstop Gary DiSarcina said, “It’s starting to seem like we’re 20 games out, because we’re getting toward the end of the line.”

DiSarcina didn’t say it, but the message was obvious: The Angels’ first-half battle cry--”It’s early, there’s no reason to panic”--no longer applies.

It’s getting late, there’s only 65 games left, and although they’re not panicking, the Angels realize if they don’t make a move soon, their season will turn from extremely disappointing to downright embarrassing.

With that in mind, the Angels beat the Seattle Mariners, 9-4, in front of 23,332 in Anaheim Stadium, a victory that might not turn their season around but certainly was a deviation from the horrendous ball they’ve played for much of the past month.

“You don’t want to get any farther behind than we are now,” said second baseman Randy Velarde, who had three hits and two RBIs. “We’ve been a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde team this year. The bad streaks seem to be the longer ones, and that’s what’s frustrating.”

The Angels equaled a season high with 18 hits; the bottom three in the order, Garret Anderson, George Arias and Pat Borders, combined for seven hits and five runs, and Tim Salmon had three hits, including a two-run homer in the third inning.

But the biggest reason the Angels are 9 1/2 games behind the Texas Rangers is pitching. Angel starters had gone 3-9 with a 9.28 earned-run average in the last 19 games, and the team had given up an average of six walks a game in that span.

But Jason Grimsley put an end to those trends--at least for one night--with a six-inning, eight-hit, four-run performance to improve to 5-6. Grimsley had only two strikeouts but walked only one and did not make the kind of glaring mistakes that have resulted in balls flying over outfield fences.

“We needed a win pretty badly,” Grimsley said. “It’s been one of those years when we can’t seem to get the hitting and pitching together on the same night. But if we can, who knows what can happen from here on out?”

Grimsley tired in the seventh, giving up three consecutive singles and two runs, but left-hander Chuck McElroy came on to end the inning by retiring Joey Cora, Alex Rodriguez and Ken Griffey.

Mike James, who had given up runs in five of his last six appearances, then pitched a scoreless eighth and ninth, as the Angels beat the Mariners for only the second time in eight tries this season.

The Mariners had won nine of their last 11 games against the Angels dating back to last September, and they amassed 21 hits in a 15-3 victory Thursday night, a series of events that had DiSarcina wondering if the Angels would ever beat Seattle again.

“They have an outstanding lineup and you can’t pitch around anyone,” DiSarcina said. “They get a guy on first base and it’s like he’s in scoring position already.”

The Mariners took a 2-0 lead Friday night on Rodriguez’s infield single, Griffey’s bloop single and Edgar Martinez’s RBI fielder’s choice in the first inning, and Cora’s double and Griffey’s RBI bloop single in the third.

But the Angels flexed their muscles to score four runs in the third and used some well-placed hits and a break to add three runs in the fourth to take a 7-2 lead.

Arias singled to open the third, stole second and took third on Borders’ single. Velarde singled to center for one run, and DiSarcina’s sacrifice moved the runners to second and third.

Jim Edmonds’ sacrifice fly scored Borders to make it 2-2, and Salmon followed with his 23rd homer of the season, a two-run shot to left off Bob Wells that gave the Angels a 4-2 lead.

“We’ve got to get on a pretty good roll,” Manager Marcel Lachemann said. “We obviously can’t go .500 the rest of the way.”