Little Things Haunt Angels

The Angels came up big against the Detroit Tigers this week. They just didn’t come up small, their failure to execute the finer points of the game contributing to their second loss in the three-game series.

Todd Greene and Garret Anderson homered, giving the Angels five home runs in three games, but the team’s inability to score after loading the bases with one out in the third inning and to drop a successful sacrifice bunt in the fifth were costly in a 4-2 loss to the Tigers on Thursday night before 12,510 in Tiger Stadium.

“Every run we scored in this series was via the home run--that tells you something,” Angel Manager Terry Collins said. “When you’re not scoring, you’ve got to do the little things to win games. We didn’t do anything to help ourselves today.”

Two players who could have helped didn’t play--cleanup batter Tim Salmon sat out his third game because of a sprained left wrist, and second baseman Randy Velarde, who is batting .336, was scratched because of a stiff lower back.

Salmon underwent an MRI test Thursday night--the results will be available today--and Velarde, who began experiencing back pain this week, will have an MRI test today in Boston.

“Any time it’s your back, you have to be concerned,” Velarde said. “This gradually got worse. I tried to hit in the batting cage . . . even just jogging around, it was real tight.”

Angel starter Chuck Finley also emerged with two bloody knees, the result of a fall he took after tagging out Juan Encarnacion at first in the second inning, but the left-hander’s pride was more bruised than his body.

Finley struck out eight and walked one in a gritty 7 1/3-inning performance, in which he gave up four runs on 10 hits, but the frustration of another unfulfilling evening seemed to get to him in the eighth.

After requesting another ball from umpire Brian O’Nora, Finley fired the one he didn’t want to catcher Charlie O’Brien from about 40 feet away, drawing gasps from a few fans.

“I usually don’t do stuff like that,” Finley said. “Maybe I was just telling myself to get with it.”

The frustration may have been cumulative. Finley has given up 10 runs over 22 innings in his last three starts, and all he has to show for it are two no-decisions and a loss.

“It’s not healthy,” he said. “It’s like going to a shrink and he tells you everything is going to be all right. Then you walk out of the office and think, ‘I don’t feel any better.’ Maybe I’m spoiled. You think because you pitch a good game you should win.”

Not when you’re hitting like the Angels, who have 25 hits in the last four games. They went 0 for 10 with runners in scoring position in Tuesday night’s loss and squandered two more prime opportunities Thursday night.

Charlie O’Brien, Andy Sheets and Darin Erstad each singled in the third, loading the bases with one out, but Jeff Huson grounded into a 6-3 double play.

After Greene’s homer in the fifth, Orlando Palmeiro reached on an infield single, and O’Brien’s squibber hopped over first baseman Tony Clark’s glove for an error.

Sheets, trying to bunt the runners over, popped out to catcher Bill Haselman, and after Erstad’s fielder’s choice, Huson flied out to end the inning.

“Not to take anything away from the Tigers, but when you have to pitch a shutout to win . . . “ Collins said. “It’s tough to be successful when you go out there knowing you can’t make mistakes.”

Adding to Angel frustration was the fact they were beaten by one of their own. He wasn’t the one who got away--Damion Easley was the one the Angels gave away, trading him to the Tigers for reliever Greg Gohr in a July 31, 1996, deal that has haunted the Angels for years.

While Gohr retired in 1997 after a brief--and undistinguished--Angel career, Easley has gone on to become one of baseball’s most productive infielders, as he reminded the Angels again.

Easley, who combined for 49 homers and 172 RBIs in 1997 and ‘98, singled in the first inning, hit a sacrifice fly in the third, doubled in the fifth and doubled and scored in the eighth to key Detroit’s victory.

“He wasn’t very healthy with us,” Finley said, “but he’s turned into a great second baseman for them.”