Velarde Offers Apology

Second baseman Randy Velarde did not retract any of the strong comments he made earlier this week regarding Manager Terry Collins, whom Velarde criticized for taking the green light he had on the basepath away while Mo Vaughn was batting.

But he did apologize to Collins for the manner in which he vented his frustration. Instead of marching into the manager’s office, the Angel veteran voiced his complaints to reporters.

“There was no excuse for the way I handled it--that was totally out of character for me,” Velarde said. “If I have a problem, I should go right to the source, not through a middle man. It won’t happen again.”

Collins and Velarde may not see eye-to-eye on this matter--Collins doesn’t want to encourage opponents to pitch around Vaughn if first base is open, and Velarde believes such an offensive approach is too passive--but Collins appreciated Velarde’s gesture.

“I just told him he has to understand the situation, and if he has a problem, come to me,” Collins said. “Because [a reporter] can’t do anything about it.”

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Since Jim Abbott was selected in 1988, the Angels have drafted only one other pitcher who won 20 games for them in a career, and that’s Jason Dickson, who is 24-23 in two seasons. The Angels have also been criticized for drafting too many left-handed finesse pitchers who rarely develop into anything more than No. 5 starters.

They did their best to rectify both shortcomings in Wednesday’s draft--the Angels’ first seven picks in the second through eighth rounds were power pitchers, all of them 6 feet 3 and 190 pounds or above.

Having lost their first-round pick as compensation for signing Vaughn, the Angels used their second-round pick, and 68th overall, on John Lackey, a 6-6 right-hander from Grayson County Junior College in Denison, Texas.

Lackey was primarily an outfielder before transferring to Grayson College, where he is 10-3 with a 4.23 earned-run average. He also hit .428 with 15 homers, 25 doubles and 81 RBIs as a first baseman.

In his first full year as a pitcher, Lackey’s fastball has been clocked at 94 mph, but he has had control problems, walking 54 in 100 innings while striking out 88. He has a scholarship offer to Texas Tech, “but I’ll probably sign with the Angels,” Lackey said.

“Being from [Abilene,] Texas, I’ve seen [the Angels] play the Rangers hundreds of times. Before today, I was [a Ranger fan]. I’m a pretty big Angel fan now.”

In the third through eighth rounds, the Angels selected Phil Wilson, a 6-6 right-handed pitcher from Poway High; Stan Bukowski, a 6-4 right-handed pitcher from Dunedin (Fla.) High; Vince Lacorte, a 6-3 right-handed pitcher from San Jose State; Dustin Bergman, a 6-4 left-handed pitcher from the University of Hawaii; Alan Wawrzyniak, a 6-3 right-handed pitcher from Philadelphia Textile University, and Aaron Franke, a 6-3 right-handed pitcher from Owens Community College in Toledo, Ohio).

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Perhaps this was some form of payback for his untimely spring training swing of a fungo bat, which broke a bone in shortstop Gary DiSarcina’s forearm, but Angel first base coach George Hendrick may have shot to the top of the freak injury charts with this one:

Hendrick popped a blood vessel in his eye while rolling over in bed Tuesday night and had to visit an eye doctor Wednesday. The injury did not prevent Hendrick from coaching first Wednesday night.

“Does that mean we’re even?” DiSarcina said, when informed of Hendrick’s injury. “That’s a good one.”