Snow Saw Angels’ Potential All Along

SAN FRANCISCO -- The Angel bandwagon is lumbering along, worn down by the weight of all those who have hopped aboard in recent weeks.

But San Francisco Giant first baseman J.T. Snow remembers when he was among the few people on board.

Snow, a former Angel, became a believer in his old club in spring training, when the Giants and Angels met three times, the Angels winning all three, 6-3, 11-10 and 13-3.

“If that team keeps hitting like this,” predicted Snow at the time, “they will win the AL West. They are a good-looking team that plays the right way.”

OK, so he was wrong. The Angels didn’t win the AL West.

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Not everyone on the Giants believes an All-California World Series is the ideal matchup.

“I would have loved to have played the New York Yankees,” said Giant owner Peter Magowan, “to get back at them for what they did to us 40 years ago.”

Talk about holding a grudge. The Yankees beat the Giants in the seventh game of the 1962 World Series, 1-0, when Willie McCovey’s two-out line drive in the ninth inning was caught by second baseman Bobby Richardson with the potential tying and winning runs in scoring position.

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Whenever a memorable moment occurs in sports, someone, it seems, steps forward to say it was predicted.

Sure enough, after San Francisco center fielder Kenny Lofton lined the pennant-winning single into right field Monday night to score David Bell and give the Giants a 2-1 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 5 of the National League championship series, Lofton revealed winning pitcher Tim Worrell was the seer.

“Tim pulled me aside in the dugout before the start of that inning,” Lofton said, “and told me, ‘You are going to win this game.’ I said, ‘All right.’ ”

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Among those with at least five at-bats, Bell is the Giants’ leading hitter in the postseason at .303 for the 10 games of the first two series.

Barry Bonds and Rich Aurilia are the team’s postseason leaders in home runs with four each, and Aurilia is the top RBI man with 12.

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The confrontation between St. Louis pitcher Garrett Stephenson and a fan outside Pacific Bell Park after Game 4, at first reported as a shoving match, may have included a punch by the Cardinal pitcher, according to a police report.

The fan, 35-year-old David Richardson of South San Francisco, was allegedly using abusive language and banging on the side of a bus containing players and family members.

Stephenson got off the bus and allegedly threw a punch, a charge denied by other members of the Cardinal organization.

Richardson was offered the opportunity by police to make a citizen’s arrest, decided against it, then changed his mind after the bus pulled away.

The case has gone to the district attorney’s office, where misdemeanor charges could be filed.