Hoping to Go From Rotten to a Bottenfield of Dreams

Right fielder Tim Salmon was so upset after the Angels let Chuck Finley go without offering the pitcher a contract in December that, at the time, he spoke openly about his desire to play out the remaining two years of his contract and sign with his hometown Arizona Diamondbacks.

Then spring training started, the left wrist he severely sprained in 1999 was back to full strength, and Salmon seemed a little more optimistic about the Angels’ immediate future, if not about his long-term future in Anaheim.

“We’re not going in with the hope we had last year, but we have guys with pride and guys who can play,” Salmon said as camp began. “I know there’s a ton of questions about our pitching, but we’ve won before with no pitching.

“We have the offense to slug it out with some teams, we have a good bullpen and a great closer in [Troy] Percival, and who knows, maybe a trade will bring a pitcher. We’re not the Yankees, but are we a pitcher away from being competitive in our division? Yes.”

Then on March 23, a trade finally brought a pitcher, right-hander Kent Bottenfield, a 1999 all-star and 18-game winner who was acquired with second baseman Adam Kennedy from the St. Louis Cardinals for center fielder Jim Edmonds, and Salmon’s mood brightened even more.

“I feel a lot better about our chances now,” Salmon said. “We’re going to miss Jim, but we have a young second baseman who looks darn good and a starting pitcher who had a good year last year, and that could make a difference, no question.

“We’ve got a lot of weapons offensively. If we can all have good years, if we can get [pitcher Tim] Belcher back, if we can get a full year out of Ken Hill, if [Ramon] Ortiz’s shoulder can bounce back, we should be all right.”

But that’s the problem with these Angels. There are still too many ifs. Bottenfield should provide a major boost to the rotation--if he can prove he’s not a one-year wonder, that a 1999 season in which he won as many games as he won in six previous major league seasons was not a fluke.

The return of a healthy Belcher from elbow surgery in late April or May should help--if he regains his 1996-98 form, when the right-hander won 42 games for the Kansas City Royals, and not his 1999 form, when he went 6-8 with a 6.73 earned-run average during an injury plagued summer.

Hill could help the Angels for a whole season--if he is not slowed by an arthritic elbow condition that can flare up at any time, and if he regains his command. The right-hander wasn’t too convincing this spring, going 0-2 with a 7.94 ERA in six Cactus League starts.

Ortiz could be one of the American League’s best young pitchers--if his 95-mph fastball and sharp slider are not affected by a slight tear in his shoulder, and if he gains more consistency and confidence than he showed last August and September, when he went 2-3 with a 6.52 ERA in nine Angel starts.

The Angels could contend in the weakened West if Jason Dickson returns to his 1997 all-star form after missing 1999 because of shoulder injury, and if the youngsters in the rotation--Ortiz and Scott Schoeneweis--can keep them in games.

New Manager Mike Scioscia could use a few sure things, but even the two most talent-rich parts of the team--offense and the bullpen--can’t be mentioned without that pesky conjunction.

The lineup could be potent--if the Angels avoid the major injuries that paralyzed them last season. And the bullpen could again be one of the best in the league--if Percival regains full velocity and command of his 95-mph fastball and the stamina that enables him to pitch three days in a row after off-season shoulder surgery.

“The biggest thing for us will be to have a lead and hand it over to Percy,” Angel shortstop Gary DiSarcina said. “We’ve got to get to him any way we can. I feel offensively we have one of the best teams we’ve had since I’ve been here.

“We don’t have a Tony Phillips-like leadoff batter, but we have proven hitters. If teams think they’re going to pound us, if they think we’re just going to roll over, they’ve got another thing coming.”

The key for the Angels could be limiting the number of times opponents pound their starting pitchers. The Angels will outslug teams on some nights, but they cannot be asked to continually erase early six-run deficits.

“If you give up a big inning early, five or six runs, it’s human nature to feel deflated,” DiSarcina said. “That’s what we have to avoid.”

Conversely, a few big early innings by the Angels could do wonders for their rotation.

“No doubt, when you’re a younger guy on the hill and you put up a six-spot behind him, he can relax a bit instead of worrying about a guy getting on base and giving up a homer,” DiSarcina said. “We have to do our best to push runs across.”

The Angel offense can’t carry this team all season, though. Few offenses, no matter how prolific, can bear that kind of burden.

Remember the 1995 Angels? Their hitters tore up the league for four months while building an 11-game division lead in early August, only to disappear for two nine-game losing streaks in which the Angels went 73 and 75 consecutive innings without holding a lead.

“Hopefully we can get off to a good start offensively and keep the machine going,” DiSarcina said. “We have to avoid having three or four guys slumping at the same time. That’s when things start sputtering, when the pressure starts to mount.”

Virtually every position player swung the bat well this spring, and the Angels have responded favorably to the more laid-back Scioscia, who replaced the ultra-intense Terry Collins, and Scioscia’s new coaching staff.

The Angels enter 2000 in good shape health-wise, and players are convinced they will be better equipped to handle internal problems than they were in 1999, when dissension during an ugly 70-92 season tore apart the clubhouse.

The burning question: Can the Angels win with this rotation?

“We haven’t won with any of the pitching we’ve had here, and we’ve certainly lost with better pitching,” DiSarcina said. “So I don’t know how to answer that.”

He will in a few months.

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