Team Declines to Help Cause

Baseball’s Hall of Fame honors players, managers, umpires, executives, even writers and broadcasters. Nowhere does it honor scouts, who discover those players.

“The scouts don’t have a presence in the Hall of Fame,” said Roberta Mazur, president of the Scout of the Year Foundation. “There’s not one display or one article that represents scouting. The scouts have always felt left out.”

The Hall of Fame recently agreed to add an exhibit honoring scouts and asked the foundation to raise $250,000 to cover the cost of developing and maintaining the display. Toward that goal, the foundation asked each major league team to contribute $5,000.

The Angels declined.

Tim Mead, the Angels’ vice president of communications, said the team endorses the addition of a scouting exhibit to the Hall of Fame. But the Angels receive so many charitable requests, he said, that they would prefer to limit them to those agreed upon by all 30 teams and paid out of a pooled fund.

“The money is not the issue,” Mead said. “We’ll support any cause baseball wants to support.”

On this cause, the Angels are in the minority. Mazur said 23 teams have contributed, with the Atlanta Braves, Milwaukee Brewers, Tampa Bay Devil Rays, Montreal Expos, San Francisco Giants and Baltimore Orioles joining the Angels as holdouts.

The Angels put catcher Jose Molina on the 15-day disabled list because of a fractured left thumb. He suffered the injury during Sunday’s 9-6 victory over the Cleveland Indians, although he stayed in the game after trainers initially evaluated him and he then doubled to start the game-winning rally. After the game, the Angels sent Molina for precautionary X-rays, which revealed the fracture.

The Angels will activate Jorge Fabregas from the disabled list today and reinstate him as the starting catcher. They replaced Molina on the roster with Jamie Burke, who was optioned to triple-A Salt Lake City on Sunday to make room for Fabregas.

In Bill Bavasi’s last trade as Angel general manager in July 1999, he sent veterans Omar Olivares and Randy Velarde to the Oakland Athletics for three prospects. Outfielder Nathan Haynes was a leadoff hitter, pitcher Elvin Nina had a terrific curveball and outfielder Jeff DaVanon was, well, a fringe prospect at best.

Two years later, Haynes is on the disabled list at double-A Erie and Nina has a 6.98 earned-run average at triple-A Salt Lake. DaVanon, 27, also at Salt Lake, leads the Pacific Coast League in batting average (.382), slugging percentage (.728), triples (seven) and extra-base hits (26). He ranks fourth in the league with 36 runs batted in.

ON DECK

Opponent--Baltimore Orioles, two games.

Site--Camden Yards.

Tonight--4 PDT.

TV--None.

Radio--KLAC (570), XPRS (1090).

Records--Angels 20-23, Orioles 20-24

Record vs. Orioles (2000)--7-5.

TONIGHT

ANGELS’

SCOTT SCHOENEWEIS

(3-2, 3.04 ERA)

vs.

ORIOLES’

PAT HENTGEN

(2-3, 3.47 ERA)

Update--The Angels have a slightly better record than Baltimore, but they’re 12 games behind the Seattle Mariners in the American League West and the Orioles are 5 1/2 games out of first place in the American League East. Opponents are batting .221 against Hentgen.

Wednesday, noon--Ramon Ortiz (3-3, 4.08 ERA) vs. Willis Roberts (4-3, 5.15 ERA).