Base Instincts Do In Angels

Aggressiveness could be a critical component of the Angels’ quest to catch Seattle and Oakland in the American League West over the second half of the season.

So could carelessness.

The Angels opened the second half Thursday by running themselves out of several scoring opportunities during a 2-1 loss to the Baltimore Orioles at Camden Yards that ended when Troy Glaus was doubled off first after failing to track the path of Jeff DaVanon’s fly ball to left field.

“I looked up too late,” said Glaus, who broke for second base on closer Jorge Julio’s pitch to DaVanon. “I didn’t pick it up until after he hit it.”

Darin Erstad was picked off first and Tim Salmon failed to take second on a throw home after singling to left, but perhaps the most egregious baserunning blunder belonged to Garret Anderson.

The left fielder failed to score what would have been the tying run in the seventh inning after initially breaking toward home plate on Bengie Molina’s one-out fly ball to medium center field. But Anderson retreated to third base as pitcher Rodrigo Lopez cut off Luis Matos’ throw home.

Angel Manager Mike Scioscia said Anderson thought he had left the bag too early and had to go back to avoid being doubled off, but Anderson said he didn’t give Scioscia that explanation.

“There’s a lot of thoughts in your head,” Anderson said of his mind-set in that situation. “It was just something that happened too quickly.... The onus is on me. It’s my fault we didn’t tie the game.”

David Eckstein tapped weakly to shortstop to end the inning as Baltimore ended the Angels’ season-high five-game winning streak.

The Angels (49-44) remained 8 1/2 games behind Seattle in the AL West and 5 1/2 games behind Boston in the wild-card standings, with Oakland in second place in each race.

Even though the Angels opened this three-city, eight-game trip on an exasperating note, Scioscia defended his team’s baserunning tactics.

“When our game is pressuring other teams, we can live with aggressive mistakes,” he said. “Even though the baserunning was maybe a factor tonight, I don’t think it killed us. We had some opportunities to swing the bats, didn’t get a key hit and that was the ballgame.”

Indeed, Lopez, the Oriole starter, escaped a two-on, no-out jam in the seventh and gave up the Angels’ only run after being confronted with the same difficulty in the fourth.

Scott Spiezio led off the fourth with a double and moved to third on Salmon’s single, though Salmon neglected to move to second on the throw home. Anderson scored Spiezio on a sacrifice fly to tie the score at 1-1, but Glaus grounded into a double play to end the threat.

Jeff Conine’s solo home run in the bottom of the inning off Ramon Ortiz broke the tie as the Orioles improved to 5-1 this season against the Angels, 3-0 at Camden Yards. Ortiz (11-7), who had won seven of his previous eight decisions, had trouble controlling his slider and gave up six hits and two runs over six innings.

Lopez (3-5) gave up one run and five hits over seven innings. Relievers B.J. Ryan and Kerry Ligtenberg shut down the Angels in the eighth, Ligtenberg getting Salmon to fly out on his one pitch, and Julio pitched a scoreless ninth for his 19th save.

Erstad also contributed to the Angels’ undoing in the sixth when he was picked off first after hitting an infield single, but the center fielder and Scioscia argued that Lopez had committed a balk on the play.

“It was a big knee bend as he was coming home,” Scioscia said of Lopez. “It was a classic balk.”