Salmon Enjoys Seeing Light of Day

Day games on Sunday in Edison Field have become almost extinct since the Walt Disney Co. purchased the Angels. After experimenting with a few early-evening Sunday starts and noticing an increase in attendance, it’s no surprise that 12 of the Angels’ 13 Sunday home games this season start at 5 p.m.

Visiting teams dislike the switch--Sunday is often get-away day, and East Coast and Midwest teams ending trips in Anaheim on Sunday often don’t get home until the wee hours of Monday morning.

Angel right fielder Tim Salmon isn’t a big fan of the move, either. Sure, it’s nice to play in front of a few more filled seats, but Salmon seems to hit more balls into the seats when the sun is shining, so he’d love to see more 1 p.m. starts.

“I’ve begged them for more day games,” Salmon said. “That’s when the game is supposed to be played, during the day. I see the ball really well during the day.”

Salmon hit two more homers--his 14th career multiple-homer game--in a 4-3 loss to Kansas City on Saturday afternoon. In three day games this season, he has nine hits in 13 at-bats (.692), four home runs, three doubles, 14 runs batted in and has scored six runs. He ranks second in the American League in homers (six) and RBIs (20).

Unfortunately for the Angels, Salmon’s teammates seem to be more nocturnal in nature. The other eight players in the lineup Saturday combined for four hits against Royal starter Jeff Suppan and relievers Alvin Morman and Jose Santiago, who struck out four in 1 1/3 innings.

In fact, no Angel batter came to the plate Saturday with a runner in scoring position. Salmon’s fourth-inning homer followed Mo Vaughn’s single, and his sixth-inning shot came with no one aboard. The Angels had only five other baserunners.

“We’ve shown that different parts of the game are there, we’re just not hitting on all cylinders,” Salmon said. “It’s one of those weird periods where we get good pitching but don’t hit, or we get good hitting and don’t pitch. But if we get this kind of pitching all year, we’re going to win.”

*

The good pitching Salmon was referring to was by Angel starter Steve Sparks, who harnessed his knuckleballs so well Saturday he gave up two runs--both unearned--on five hits in 5 2/3 innings, striking out four and walking three.

After shortstop Andy Sheets missed Mike Sweeney’s liner in the fourth, Larry Sutton and Tim Spehr hit two-out, run-scoring singles for the Royals. Sparks escaped a bases-loaded, one-out jam in the fifth.

“It was dancing--he had the knuckler going today,” Angel catcher Matt Walbeck said. “I was doing the best I can just to get some leather on it. You can say what you want, that it looks easy catching the thing, but until you do it in a big league game . . . there’s no predicting where it’s going.”

*

Kansas City scored its third run in the seventh when Sweeney doubled against reliever Al Levine and took third on a wild pitch. Levine walked Jermaine Dye, reliever Mike Holtz walked Johnny Damon, and reliever Shigetoshi Hasegawa gave up Scott Leius’ sacrifice fly.

“We hurt ourselves with bases on balls just as much as [errors],” Angel Manager Terry Collins said. “You have to make guys swing the bats to beat you. If you continue to give the other team opportunities, sooner or later they’re going to get a hit.”

TODAY

ANGELS’

CHUCK FINLEY

(1-2, 7.94)

vs.

ROYALS’

JAY WITASICK

(0-1, 4.91 ERA)

Kauffman Stadium, Kansas City, Mo., 11 a.m. PDT

Radio--KLAC (570)

* Update--The Angels have managed only six hits in each of their two games against the Royals, and they had only eight hits in each of their three losses to Toronto on this road trip, so they need better production if they are to snap out of this funk, in which they’ve lost six of seven games. Finley gave up five runs on five hits in 4 2/3 innings of a 5-1 loss to Toronto on Tuesday night, a lackluster effort in which he threw 100 pitches.