Angels Refuse to Slide Away

The Angels may be running on empty these days, but Manager Terry Collins is still able to twist his perspective until sees the tank as half full.

“We’re playing as bad as we can play and we’re still in first place,” he said before Wednesday night’s game against Tampa Bay. And he even managed a weary grin.

But when someone pointed out that the Angels couldn’t seem to catch a break while losing 10 of 12, he wasn’t smiling anymore. “We’re not getting any good breaks, but we’re not playing any good baseball, either,” he said.

Both trends pretty much continued Wednesday night as the Angels beat the losingest team in the American League, 4-2, in front of 19,681 at Edison Field. The Angels lost ace Chuck Finley for the night on a freak play in the fifth inning when he slid on both knees while trying to tag out Dwight Winn at first base and opened a cut on his right knee. And they continued to play some very shaky defense.

But, hey, an ugly victory over the flagging Devil Rays--who committed two errors to the Angels’ one--counts the same as any other in the standings and the Angels increased their lead to 1 1/2 games over the Texas Rangers, who suffered a 14-3 thrashing at the hands of Baltimore.

“When you have Chuck pitching, you can’t help but go in with a good feeling,” Collins said. “You just know he’ll give you some good innings.”

Finley, whose only outing shorter than Wednesday’s was on May 2 when he was struck on the elbow by a line drive, was grinding out another one--the only two runs he gave up were unearned, coming after an error by third baseman Dave Hollins--when Winn hit a grounder wide of first. Cecil Fielder snagged the ball near the outfield grass and threw to Finley, who fell to his knees and tried to swipe a tag on Winn as he raced past.

Finley wasn’t limping as he returned to the mound and trainer Rick Smith tended to the wound on the field, but the veteran left-hander left the game without trying any warmup pitches. He received several stitches and is listed as day to day.

Shigetoshi Hasegawa came on in relief and gave up a single and a walk to load the bases with one out. But the Angels escaped when Hasegawa struck out Aaron Ledesma and Hollins held on to Paul Sorrento’s pop foul despite a jarring collision with catcher Matt Walbeck.

Fielder had given the Angels a 3-2 lead in the fourth when he launched a rocket 410 feet into the left-field bleachers--his first home run since June 28--and then increased the margin to two runs in the fifth with a run-scoring single to center after third baseman Bobby Smith’s fielding error on a Tim Salmon grounder extended the inning.

The Angels’ run of foul luck and their lack of clutch hitting seemed to have changed in the first inning when Darin Erstad beat out a grounder to short and scored from first on Salmon’s two-out double to left-center. Salmon came around to make it 2-0 when Garret Anderson hit a popup to short center that dropped between shortstop Ledesma, second baseman Miguel Cairo and center-fielder Winn.

The Angels’ fielding woes continued, however. In the fourth, Quinton McCracken’s grounder to third eluded Hollins for an error. Hollins, who made only two errors in the first 42 games, has committed two in as many games and 11 in the last 44.

McCracken stole second and scored on Smith’s single to right. Smith stole second, took third on a groundout and scored on Sorrento’s sacrifice fly.

The Angels managed to make the plays after that, Fielder and Salmon provided enough scoring punch and Hasegawa--who gave up only three hits in 3 1/3 innings to pick up his fourth victory in five decisions--combined with Greg Cadaret and Troy Percival (27th save) to hold the less-than-awe-inspiring Devil Ray lineup at bay.

“Sure, we’ll take another month like June [when the Angels were 22-6], but right now, we just have to start playing better so we can build on that,” Collins said. “If we start playing like we can, it will take care of itself.

“And if we don’t start playing like we can, well, it will take care of itself.”