At Least Angel Bats Are Jumping

The Angels have played so well these past two weeks, they’re starting to think they’re capable of superhuman feats, which is about the only way to explain why shortstop David Eckstein, all 5 feet 7, 165 pounds of him, thought he could leap over 6-3, 240-pound Tampa Bay catcher Toby Hall in the sixth inning of the Angels’ 7-3 victory Thursday night.

A Hall pass was not in order this time -- Eckstein was tagged out trying to score on Chone Figgins’ grounder, and the Devil Ray catcher flipped Eckstein over his shoulders, the maneuver providing a moment of levity for the Angel Stadium crowd of 34,538.

“We’ve got to work on that play,” Manager Mike Scioscia said of Eckstein. “I think he had a better chance of going through the catcher’s legs.”

That was about the only area in which the Angels came up short Thursday night, though. Behind Aaron Sele’s quality start and a five-run fifth-inning outburst capped by Jose Guillen’s three-run home run, the Angels won for the 12th time in 14 games and extended their win streak to six. They have baseball’s best record at 19-10.

Trailing, 3-1, the Angels strung together four consecutive singles off Tampa Bay starter Jeremi Gonzalez to open the fifth inning, by Darin Erstad, Figgins, Vladimir Guerrero and Troy Glaus, the latter two knocking in runs to tie the score, 3-3.

Devil Ray Manager Lou Piniella pulled his starter in favor of right-hander Dicky Gonzalez, whose first pitch, a hanging slider, was hammered by Guillen well beyond the left-field wall for a three-run home run and a 6-3 Angel lead.

Guillen added a single in the seventh and is now batting .396 (17 for 45) in his last 13 games with five home runs and 18 runs batted in, including three homers and nine RBIs in the last three games.

“Not only does he hit with power, but he knows how to hit,” Scioscia said of Guillen. “He fits right in with this group. He’s showing why he had such a terrific year last year and why there were such high expectations on him when he came up as a kid with Pittsburgh.”

Guillen got a scare in his first at-bat when he was hit in the side by a Gonzalez fastball -- for a moment, it appeared the pitch might hit Guillen in the left wrist, a spot in which he was drilled twice in early April.

But that hardly disrupted Guillen’s stroke and confidence. After lining out to center field in the fourth inning, Guillen turned on Gonzalez’s first offering for his game-breaking homer in the fifth.

“I was just looking for a good pitch to hit for an RBI,” Guillen said. “It was a hanging slider. I stayed back and pulled the trigger on it.”

Sele, who earned a rotation spot on the strength of his five spotless innings in a spot start for Kelvim Escobar on Saturday in Minnesota, looked as if he might squander the opportunity when he gave up singles to Julio Lugo and Tino Martinez and a two-run single to Rocco Baldelli in the first inning.

But the veteran right-hander rallied, and with the help of Guerrero, the Angel right fielder who gunned down Lugo at the plate on Martinez’s third-inning single, Sele limited the Devil Rays to one run over the next five innings to improve to 1-0.

Sele gave up three runs and eight hits in six innings, striking out two and walking two, and of his 96 pitches, 60 were strikes. Sele gave way to Scot Shields to start the seventh, and Shields retired nine in a row over the final three innings.

“When you give up runs as a starter, you want to give them up early and give your team a chance to get into the flow of the game,” Sele said. “My pitches were up in the first two innings, but in the third inning, I made an adjustment and my ball came down. I just tried to keep it close, pitch deep into the game and give our offense a chance to catch up.”

Gonzalez (0-4) gave up five runs and seven hits and walked five in four innings to tie Albie Lopez’s franchise record by losing his 10th consecutive decision -- dating back to his last victory Aug. 19 in Baltimore.