Percival’s Free Passes Hand Win to Orioles

Give Angel closer Troy Percival a lead in the ninth inning, and odds are the right-hander will slam the door, preserving a victory. Give Percival a tie score in the ninth, and, well, odd things seem to happen.

Percival and ties have been a volatile mix, and the two combined for another ninth-inning blowup Sunday night, as the Baltimore Orioles tagged Percival for three runs in a 7-4 victory before 38,840 in Edison Field.

Four Percival walks, including a four-pitch pass to Rafael Palmeiro with the bases loaded, gave the Orioles a 5-4 lead, and Cal Ripken Jr. sealed Baltimore’s 10th win in 11 games with a two-run single, as the Angels fell to second place in the American League West, a half-game behind Texas.

“If you get five hits off me, fine, but the defense can’t help when I’m walking people,” said Percival, who gave up one hit and fell to 2-4. “I’ve been in a great groove for six weeks, my arm felt good, but I just couldn’t get the ball down.”

Sunday was the fifth time this season Percival has entered a game with the score tied, and his performance in those situations is surprising for a guy who leads the league with 27 saves: he’s given up seven earned runs in 5 1/3 innings and has a 1-3 record.

“In the past, my approach going into tie games has been poor, but that didn’t have anything to do with tonight,” Percival said. “My approach was great. I was aggressive. It was just one of those nights when it didn’t matter what I did--I couldn’t put the ball where I wanted it.”

He didn’t miss by much. After walking Jeff Reboulet, Brady Anderson and Eric Davis, Percival’s four pitches to Palmeiro appeared to hit the outside corner, roughly thigh- or waist-high, but umpire Gary Cederstrom ruled they were too high.

Percival tried to compensate by switching to a slide-step delivery, and that did bring his pitches down. “But by doing that I lost some velocity,” Percival said, “and that’s when Cal got ahold of one.”

Angel catcher Matt Walbeck said most of Percival’s pitches weren’t off the plate, “but the ump said they were up,” he said. “There wasn’t much I could do.” Percival didn’t argue, either.

“I’m rarely going to beg for pitches,” he said. “Those are not quality pitches, anyway. If they’re swinging, they’re going to get hit because they were thigh high . . .

“I’m ticked off, I’m frustrated, but the game is over, and there’s nothing I can do about it. . . . We got four runs off [Baltimore ace Mike] Mussina, and the guys did a fantastic job. They didn’t deserve to lose that game.”

The Angels weren’t thrilled about facing Mussina in the twilight and shadows of a 5 p.m. start, but as Manager Terry Collins said: “I don’t care if it’s midnight, 1 o’clock or 5 o’clock, it’s never fun to face a guy like Mussina.”

The Angels didn’t seem to mind. They took a 1-0 lead in the third when Justin Baughman reached on Reboulet’s error, stole second and scored on Darin Erstad’s double to right-center, Erstad’s fifth hit in six career at-bats against the Oriole right-hander.

Davis tied it in the sixth with a solo home run to center off Angel starter Omar Olivares, and the Orioles took a 2-1 lead when B.J. Surhoff walked with two out and scored on Chris Hoiles’ RBI double to left-center.

The Angels countered with three in the bottom of the sixth, as Gary DiSarcina singled, Erstad reached on a catcher’s interference call, and Jim Edmonds slapped an RBI single to left-center.

Tim Salmon struck out and Cecil Fielder grounded out, but Garret Anderson came through with a two-run triple to right-center, extending his career-best hitting streak to 17 games and giving the Angels a 4-2 lead.

But Olivares and reliever Greg Cadaret couldn’t hold it. Rich Becker walked with one out in the seventh, and Collins summoned the left-handed Cadaret to face Anderson, who struck out looking.

Collins took his chances having Cadaret pitch to Davis, and Davis made Collins pay, blasting a two-run homer to left-center for his 15th career multihomer game and a 4-4 tie. “We have 65 games left,” Collins said, “and each game where you get a lead and you can’t pull it out becomes real, real important.”