Percival, Angels Can’t Close the Deal Against White Sox

It’s the ultimate indignity for baseball’s elite closers, taking the mound to start the ninth inning with a two-run lead and walking into the dugout to a smattering of boos before the game is over.

This is not familiar territory for Angel right-hander Troy Percival, who can usually be found pumping his fist into the air to punctuate his saves, but it was where Percival was forced to roam Saturday night.

Trailing the entire game and staring at the daunting force that is Percival, the Chicago White Sox put up a five-spot in the top of the ninth inning against the ultra-reliable reliever and beat the Angels, 8-5, before 35,296 in Edison Field.

Ray Durham snapped a 5-5 tie with a three-run home run off Percival, and snapped along with it was the Angels’ three-game winning streak. Percival gave up five runs, the most of any outing in his big league career, on five hits in the ninth before being pulled for Mark Petkovsek.

“I didn’t have my fastball, and I wasn’t hitting any spots tonight,” Percival said. “I threw it over the middle of the plate, where good hitters can get to it. I should have mixed up my other pitches, but I didn’t do it.”

Percival threw 11 pitches to save Friday night’s victory over Chicago. He had pitched in two of the previous three games, and Shigetoshi Hasegawa breezed through the eighth inning Saturday night, but neither Manager Terry Collins nor Percival second-guessed the decision to go to the closer.

“Sometimes the third night I pitch is my best night,” Percival said. “I’ve just got to do a better job adjusting. I’m not happy with the way I went about it.”

Trailing, 5-3, Greg Norton opened the ninth by blasting a 2-1 fastball into the right-field seats for his first home run of the season, and Darrin Jackson followed with a single to right-center, a ball that right fielder Tim Salmon appeared to have a chance of catching but lost momentarily in the lights.

Paul Konerko popped to third for the first out, but Jeff Abbott, who had one hit and eight strikeouts in 27 at-bats (.037) against right-handers this season, lined a hit-and-run single through the second-base hole vacated by Randy Velarde, advancing Jackson to third.

Chicago Manager Jerry Manuel sent left-handed hitting Jeff Liefer up to hit for Brook Fordyce, and with pinch-runner McKay Christensen running from first, Liefer blooped an RBI single into shallow left-center field.

Had Angel shortstop Andy Sheets not broken toward second base to cover the bag, he would have had a decent chance of catching the popup. Instead, Liefer wound up with his first major league RBI, and the score was tied, 5-5.

It didn’t remain even for long. Durham ripped an 0-1 pitch into the right-field bleachers for his sixth homer of the season and an 8-5 lead.

“That was a belt-high fastball right down the middle,” Percival said of the pitch to Durham, “and that’s all there was to it.”

White Sox reliever David Lundquist, who struck out three in two scoreless innings, earned his first career victory, and closer Bob Howry struck out two of three in the ninth for his seventh save.

“Troy goes in there like he usually does and goes right after people,” Collins said. “And then Tim loses one in the lights, a ball hits one hole, another ball hits the other hole, and the next guy hits it out of the park.”

Wasted by the Angels was a vintage outing by Chuck Finley. In seven innings, he worked his way out of occasional jams, pitched well enough to earn a victory but not quite well enough to make anyone in the Angel dugout feel very secure.

It wasn’t the best outing of his career by any means, but Finley was more than competent, giving up three runs and eight hits in seven innings, striking out four and walking two.

Also wasted was Garret Anderson’s three hits and two RBIs, and another strong performance by Velarde, who had an RBI single in the first inning and a homer in the third. Anderson’s RBI single, which followed Troy Glaus’ single and stolen base, made it 3-0 in the fourth.

Chicago nicked Finley for two runs in the fifth, as Jackson doubled and scored on Fordyce’s RBI groundout, and Abbott walked and eventually scored on Durham’s RBI single, but the Angels answered with two runs in the bottom of the fifth on RBI singles by Glaus and Anderson.