Snow Finds Sun Against Angels

The most difficult season of San Francisco Giant first baseman J.T. Snow’s life has taken a turn for the better. Strange as it seems, it might have taken a tragic event--the death of his mother--for Snow to begin to resemble the player who tore up the National League in 1997.

While 54-year-old Merry Carole Snow was fighting a lengthy battle against cancer, J.T. was fighting many losing battles against opposing pitchers, the burden of his mother’s illness proving too much for the former Angel standout to bear.

After a 28-homer, 104-RBI season in 1997, Snow had only five homers and 31 RBIs the day his mother died, June 17.

But since then, Snow, relieved his mother is no longer in pain, has gone on a tear that continued with his two-homer, four-RBI performance to lead the Giants to a 7-4 interleague victory over the Angels Thursday night before 33,272 at Edison Field.

After missing five games to attend the funeral, Snow has gone 11 for 33 (.333) with four homers and 11 RBIs in 10 games, improving his average to .225 with nine homers and 42 RBIs.

“The whole situation with my mom was tough to go through, but it’s been a lot more relaxing lately,” Snow said. “I’ve been able to get back to just playing baseball. It’s a little easier since all the crying and the heartache disappeared. . . .

“My focus is on the game again. Not that it wasn’t before, but this game is hard enough when there’s nothing else on your mind. When your mind is clouded, I don’t think you see the ball and concentrate as well as you can.”

Snow couldn’t have timed his outburst any better.

San Francisco was without its best hitter, left fielder Barry Bonds, who came down with such a severe case of gastroenteritis Thursday that he spent part of the afternoon in a hospital, getting a bag of fluids pumped intravenously into his arm.

But Snow gave the Giant offense a booster shot when he capped a three-run first inning with a two-run homer to right field off Angel starter and loser Jason Dickson (8-6).

The switch-hitter added an RBI double in the third and started a three-run sixth with a solo homer to right for his eighth multiple-homer game and second against the Angels.

That helped give the Giants a 7-1 cushion, which made Angel third baseman Dave Hollins’ three-run homer in the bottom of the ninth off reliever Rich Rodriguez easier to absorb.

Snow came within inches of a fourth hit when left fielder Darin Erstad made a shoestring catch of his seventh-inning liner, and on his way back to the dugout, Snow cursed several times toward the Angel dugout.

“There were a couple of coaches yelling at me during my at-bat,” Snow said. “I stepped out a couple times. I don’t think it was very professional. I don’t think it was any coaches I played for when I was there. You guys can figure it out.”

Larry Bowa, the Angel third-base coach, said there wasn’t much sting to his jabs. “We were just telling him to get back into the box,” he said. “He kept stepping out.”

Perhaps the Angels were letting off a little steam. They outhit the Giants, 15-10, but still lost their second consecutive game, missing another chance to increase their lead over Texas in the American League West.

“We hit the ball real good, but we just didn’t come up with the hits to get us going,” Angel Manager Terry Collins said. “It really doesn’t matter how many hits you get if you don’t get on the scoreboard.”

Dickson, who had won five consecutive decisions from May 31-June 21, was not sharp, giving up seven runs and nine hits in 5 1/3 innings and losing his second in a row.

Erstad homered to lead off the game, his 18th, and Hollins blasted his ninth-inning shot over both bullpens in left, but there was little substance to the Angel offense in between.

The Angels had two on with one out in the third, sixth and seventh innings but couldn’t score. Giant left-hander Kirk Rueter gave up one run and nine hits in 5 1/3 innings to improve to 10-3, and Julian Tavarez added 2 2/3 innings of scoreless relief.

* ANGELS REPORT, C14