All He Needed Was Kick to Start

Those conversations with coaches about mechanics, pitch selection and location are all well and good, but sometimes all an ace needs to jump-start his season is a kick in the pants from his friendly neighborhood shortstop.

That’s what Angel pitcher Chuck Finley got from Gary DiSarcina, and the left-hander responded with a superb 7 1/3-inning, five-hit effort Tuesday to lead the Angels to a 4-1 interleague victory over the Colorado Rockies before 48,235 in Coors Field.

Finley, working his fastball inside and forkball down, struck out six and induced 12 ground-ball outs in baseball’s most homer-friendly park, and closer Troy Percival worked 1 2/3 scoreless innings for his 10th save.

Jim Edmonds hit a two-run home run in the third, Luis Alicea had a bases-empty blast in the ninth and Tim Salmon had four hits, including an RBI double in the first, but it was Finley who was most responsible for the Angels ending a 4-5 trip on such a high note.

“When he’s on the mound, he usually has an air about him, and the level of intensity for the guys behind him goes up,” DiSarcina said. “He has to give off that scent that he’s going to shut down the other team, and today he had that.”

Finley (4-6) gave off a stench in his previous two starts, giving up a combined 14 runs on 14 hits--six of them homers--in games against Oakland on June 22 (no decision) and Seattle onFriday (loss), and he struggled in losses to Minnesota on June 6 and Kansas City on June 11.

The Angels are in the hunt in the American League West, but the questions persist: How much better would they be if Finley had won more than three games? What’s wrong with Chuck?

DiSarcina, who said he “loves Chuck like a brother,” recalled a conversation with Finley in May 1996, when the shortstop was hitting .200 and Finley gave him a pep talk, and he decided to return the favor Saturday in Seattle.

“He was scuffling and he was lost mentally,” DiSarcina said. “You see the way he’s pitching and you can only hold stuff in for so long. . . . I basically told him he’s our No. 1 guy and we depend on him.

“I didn’t want to put pressure on him, but I told him to be yourself, keep your head high in the clubhouse, keep razzing the rookies like you always do. Everyone needs a pat on the back, and no one was giving him one.”

Finley, who started Tuesday on three days’ rest, had a slightly different interpretation.

“It was more of a kick in the butt,” he said. “We had a long talk, and he told me about some things I wasn’t doing. . . . I know I’m a much better pitcher than I was in the first half. I know I was killing the team. But you can’t pitch today to make up for five bad starts. You have to move on.”

Both Finley and Percival were aided Tuesday by a strong cross wind, which blew from left field to right and knocked down several fly balls.

The Angels had a 3-1 lead when Percival replaced Finley with two on in the eighth, and Andres Galarraga drove a ball to deep center field. But Orlando Palmeiro, who replaced the injured Edmonds in the seventh, made a nice running catch at the wall after a 360-degree turn following the ball.

Dante Bichette then drove a ball to left that simply nose-dived in the wind, and Tony Phillips made the catch to end the inning.

“If the wind wasn’t blowing,” Palmeiro said, “those balls would have been gone.”

Finley, however, took the thin-air factor out of play by keeping most of his pitches down and forcing ground balls.

“If you keep the ball out of the air here, you have a chance to win some games,” Angel Manager Terry Collins said. “This was a huge start for Chuck, not only because it will get him going, but because of the team he was going against and the park he was in.”

Finley wasted little time between pitches and appeared more confident, attacking hitters with his fastball and showing no fear of throwing inside. He seemed to have that air that DiSarcina was talking about, but Finley said it may have been something of an illusion.

“It may look like you’re aggressive and working faster,” he said, “when balls are not getting rapped off the walls.”