Angels Leaving on the Right Note

Luis Alicea came out of Sunday’s game looking forward, thinking of what was left for the Angels to do instead of what they had just accomplished.

Yet, what Alicea had just done was the reason the Angels moved a step forward. His three runs batted in pushed them to a 9-5 victory over the Toronto Blue Jays in front of 19,671 at Anaheim Stadium. It was the Angels’ 12th victory in 13 games and kept them a half-game behind the Seattle Mariners.

The Blue Jays, meanwhile, were left to look back in anger, as both Manager Cito Gaston and outfielder Joe Carter were ejected.

Neither incident concerned the Angels, who were focused on taking their momentum into an 11-games-in-nine-days trip.

“New York is trying to catch Baltimore . . . Cleveland is trying to stay on top [of its division],” Manager Terry Collins said. “Good teams play differently in the second half.”

Something Alicea knows well, having been a part of playoff runs in Boston and St. Louis the past two seasons.

“What we do right now, in the second half, is what counts,” Alicea said.

The Angels won for the 10th time in 11 games since the All-Star break. It was a victory that had Alicea’s mark on it.

He got the Angels even in the fourth inning, when he golfed Luis Andujar’s 3-2 pitch over the right-field fence to tie the score, 3-3.

“I didn’t think it was out,” Alicea said. “I was just trying to hit the ball somewhere. [Andujar] struck me out on the same pitch the previous at-bat and I had just missed two of them before I hit the home run.”

Alicea singled home Todd Greene in the sixth to give the Angels a 5-3 lead, then scored their last run in the eighth.

“Today was just my lucky day,” Alicea said. “Each day, we seem to have a different hero.”

There were others Sunday.

Darin Erstad had three hits and scored three runs. Garret Anderson had a two-run single in the seventh to give the Angels an 8-5 lead. Tim Salmon drove in two runs, giving him 17 RBIs the last 15 games. Chuck Finley picked up his fifth consecutive victory, matching his career-best streak set in 1989.

Finley (8-6) gave up five runs in 6 1/3 innings, but also struck out eight. He retired eight in a row between the fourth and seventh innings, when the Angels went from trailing, 3-1, to leading, 6-3.

All of which sent the Angels on what could be a make-or-break trip.

“Now is when we have to keep our intensity up,” Alicea said.

The Blue Jays managed to keep theirs up Sunday. It just was focused differently.

They had three runs and the bases loaded in the third when Tilson Brito hit a ground ball to third baseman Jack Howell, who started a home-to-first double play. Replays showed that Brito was safe. Gaston argued the call and was ejected by first-base umpire Mike Everitt.

In the seventh, Carter took a called strike on a 1-1 pitch and backed out of the batter’s box. Carter, who had argued with home plate umpire John Hirschbeck after being called out on strikes in the fifth, exchanged more words with Hirschbeck and was ejected.

“He never cussed,” said Hirschbeck. “He didn’t like the first pitch. He went on and on about it. I said, ‘Joe that’s enough,’ but he went into too much detail.”

Said Carter: “If you can’t have a normal conversation about a disagreement, what’s the sense? It’s not fair to the game. It’s not fair to the players.”

But it made for good theater.

“I don’t ever recall seeing a player ejected during an at-bat,” Collins said.

Collins didn’t dwell on it, though. There are other thoughts that concern him, and the Angels.

Said pitcher Troy Percival: “If we are the best team in the West Division, which I know in my heart we are, then we have to go East and play well.”

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Angels on the Move

ON JULY 1

Record: 39-42

Games behind: 8

Batting average: .257

Runs per game: 4.06

Doubles: 1.5

Home runs: 1.0

ERA: 3.52

IN JULY

Record: 13-4

Games behind: 3

Batting average: .318

Runs per game: 6.35

Doubles: 2.1

Home runs: 1.3

ERA: 3.46