Glaus Does Launch

Troy Glaus was showing off some new spikes to his teammates Tuesday morning, a pair of shoes with orange flames painted on the soles.

“They’ll make me run faster,” the Angel third baseman joked.

No need for the afterburners Tuesday afternoon. Glaus spent much of the season opener in a trot, not a sprint, crushing two home runs to dead center field to catapult the Angels toward a 10-5 victory over the Seattle Mariners before a sellout crowd of 46,142 in Safeco Field.

Glaus’ solo shot in the fourth inning--on a 3-and-0 pitch from Mariner left-hander Jamie Moyer -- broke a 1-1 tie, and Glaus broke the game open with a three-run shot in the sixth, becoming the third Angel in franchise history -- after Joe Rudi in 1980 and Ted Kluszewski in the team’s inaugural game in 1961 -- to hit two home runs in a season opener.

They were also the first home runs Glaus has hit in Safeco Field, where he had a .155 career average (18 for 116) with eight runs batted in and was shut out in the 2001 All-Star game home run derby.

“Typically, this is not a hitter’s park,” said Glaus, who has 17 career multi-homer games. “The air is usually heavy and the park is big. It’s tough to hit one out here.”

Catcher Jose Molina, subbing for injured brother Bengie, added a solo home run in the second inning, a double and a rare stolen base, and Vladimir Guerrero, in his Angel debut, added a two-run double in a four-run eighth to back the superb pitching of Bartolo Colon, who held Seattle to one unearned run and five hits in six innings, striking out five and walking none.

The Angels, who lost their previous four season openers, survived a white-knuckle eighth, in which reliever Scot Shields’ control problems led to four Mariner runs, trimming a 10-1 Angel lead to 10-5.

But setup man Francisco Rodriguez bailed out the Angels, getting Dan Wilson to ground out to shortstop with runners on second and third to end the eighth and adding a scoreless ninth to preserve the victory for Colon, who mixed fire with finesse to give the Angels their first return on a four-year, $51-million investment.

Colon, as is often the case with the burly right-hander, got stronger as the game went on; his 100th--and last--pitch of the day was a 97-mph fastball to strike out Edgar Martinez looking to end the sixth.

“He kept throwing harder and harder and hitting his spots better and better every inning,” Jose Molina said. “Usually, with most pitchers, it’s the other way around.”

The Mariners were most impressed with a second-inning sequence, in which Colon got Ichiro Suzuki to bounce a changeup to first baseman Darin Erstad for the second out and blew a full-count 98-mph, fastball by Randy Winn for strike three, stranding runners on second and third to preserve a 1-1 tie.

“That two-strike changeup to Ichiro, that’s something I’ve never seen him throw before,” Seattle Manager Bob Melvin said. “He was throwing sliders in off counts. You never knew what to expect from him. And, of course, with two strikes, he can rear back and throw 97 mph.”

Colon said Tuesday was “a very emotional day” for him because some 20 family members, including several brothers and a sister who traveled from the Dominican Republic and had never seen him pitch in the big leagues in person, were in attendance.

He was a little shaky at first, ending the first and second innings with runners on second and third, but he retired 13 of 14 batters from the second through sixth.

“The changeup was working real well today, especially against right-handed hitters in situations where they were sitting on my fastball,” Colon said through an interpreter. “After four innings, I started picking it up, finding my rhythm and executing more pitches. It’s a good way to start.”

The same could be said for Glaus, who went a long way toward putting an injury-plagued 2003 season behind him.

“Troy has had a tough time hitting in this park, but those two balls were crushed,” Manager Mike Scioscia said. “That’s a good sign for us.”