Angels Make It Easy for Blue Jays

Brad Fullmer swung and missed for strike three, then started to walk toward the dugout. The umpire ruled a foul tip -- incorrectly, it appeared, according to television replays -- so Fullmer got a reprieve. He swung and missed, again.

It was that kind of afternoon for the last-place Angels on Sunday, a day so ugly that Manager Mike Scioscia kept the clubhouse doors shut for 15 minutes, for the first postgame meeting of a tremendously disappointing and potentially embarrassing season for the defending World Series champions. The Toronto Blue Jays completed a three-game sweep with an 8-2 victory that offered Scioscia no shortage of topics for his lecture.

Fullmer struck out twice in that one at-bat. The Blue Jays scored two runs on an infield single. Jeff DaVanon struck out four times. The Angels rushed Francisco Rodriguez into the game in the fourth inning. Tim Salmon’s 20-game hitting streak expired when he failed to get a ball out of the infield in four at-bats.

After the Blue Jays took a 6-2 lead in the fourth, the Angels didn’t get another hit. Closer Troy Percival, who never entered a game with the Angels losing during last year’s championship season, mopped up in the eighth.

Scioscia, calmly but forcefully, told his players that such ragged efforts are not acceptable and that better days are ahead when the team reverts to its sharp, aggressive form of a year ago.

“It was definitely positive,” outfielder Eric Owens said. “You didn’t see any panic in his voice.”

Said Scioscia: “If you get beat, you get beat, but you need to bring your game every night. We weren’t able to control things the way I know we can.... We didn’t bring our game, and Toronto kicked our butts this weekend.”

The Angels stole four bases Sunday, including a double steal in the first inning by Garret Anderson and Troy Glaus. But another play in the inning undoubtedly caught Scioscia’s attention -- for the second consecutive game, Owens failed to advance a runner.

Owens has been the primary replacement for center fielder and team leader Darin Erstad, without whom the Angels are 4-8. Scioscia reminded his players every team suffers injuries and the Angels are expected to survive this one.

“We’re deep. We’re good,” Scioscia said. “We have enough guys who are in roles they should be good in.”

Ramon Ortiz, so good in pitching a complete game seven days ago, gave up nine hits in 3 2/3 innings Sunday, although whether he should have been around to give up the last hit was questionable. With the score tied, 2-2, in the fourth, Ortiz nearly escaped a bases-loaded jam, giving up three consecutive singles before getting a force play at home and a foul pop. Vernon Wells walked, forcing home a run.

Rodriguez was ready and rested. With Percival also rested, Scioscia figured the Angels could bridge the middle innings with Rodriguez, Scott Schoeneweis and Brendan Donnelly. Carlos Delgado, the next hitter, leads the American League in runs batted in and has a .500 career average against Ortiz.

On Ortiz’s 90th pitch, Delgado doubled home three runs. Scioscia then summoned Rodriguez to replace Ortiz.

“I thought he had as good a chance to get Delgado as anybody,” Scioscia said. “He was one pitch away from getting out of the jam. But he didn’t, and they broke the game open.”

Said Salmon: “That pretty much took the wind out of our sails.”

The Angels did not get a hit thereafter.

They were swept by the Blue Jays for the first time in four years, outscored, 18-4, by a team with the worst earned-run average in the league.

Adam Kennedy muttered after striking out for the final out, so loudly that Toronto pitcher Kelvim Escobar took it personally and had to be restrained .

“When they went up 6-2 and 8-2, frustration set in on our part,” Kennedy said. “They probably sensed that a little bit and buried us.”