A Big 10-4 for Angels, Kotchman

Casey Kotchman hit a solo home run in the second inning and a grand slam in the third, leaving six innings for the injured first baseman to endure a torrent of good-natured abuse from his teammates.

“I don’t think anybody didn’t drop a Wally Pipp on me,” Darin Erstad said. “That’s the most I’ve ever been called Wally in my life.”

With Kotchman reaching base four times and driving in five runs and Adam Kennedy hitting a homer and driving in four, the Angels routed the Tampa Bay Devil Rays on Sunday, 10-4, at Angel Stadium. Bartolo Colon gave up two runs in seven innings for his 14th victory, second in the American League to Jon Garland of the Chicago White Sox.

The Angels remained tied with the Oakland Athletics atop the AL West, with a three-game showdown starting Tuesday in Oakland. On the Angels’ flight to the Bay Area tonight, Manager Mike Scioscia can ponder whether he has finally found his designated hitter.

“Whether it’s Kotchman that can emerge as an everyday guy, or someone else, we’re going to keep searching,” Scioscia said.

In 1925, Pipp got the day off for the New York Yankees, and Lou Gehrig started in his place -- for the next 14 years. The Roaring 20s, after all, did not include the designated hitter.

With the soreness in Erstad’s hip all but gone, the Angels plan to return him to first base Tuesday. But Kotchman, his understudy, could find himself in a new role.

Four months into the season, the Angels still don’t have a DH. They intended to platoon -- Jeff DaVanon against right-handers and Juan Rivera against left-handers -- but DaVanon is batting .211 against right-handers and Rivera .224 against left-handers. The Angels have a league-low five home runs from the DH spot.

Kotchman’s two Sunday gave him three in the weekend series. Vladimir Guerrero is the only other Angel to hit two in a game this season.

Scioscia isn’t pretending that Kotchman is the second coming of Gehrig, or Guerrero for that matter. But Kotchman gets on base -- five walks and no strikeouts in 20 at-bats with the Angels, 43 walks and 40 strikeouts in 363 at-bats at triple-A Salt Lake.

If the power display isn’t a one-day show, Kotchman could offer on-base percentage and power to a lineup starved for both.

“It’s going to take more than Vlad and G.A. [Garret Anderson] in the middle of the lineup to get this done,” Scioscia said.

For now, Kotchman has emerged as an option, even if he publicly describes himself as a spare part.

“I just feel privileged to be here in this clubhouse, around this group of players, and be able to help out a little bit,” he said. “I just try to stay out of the way of these guys.”

The Angels were worried that Kotchman was trying to turn himself into a power hitter at the expense of his sweet swing, so worried that Scioscia said he had reminded Kotchman earlier this season to stop pulling the ball and let the power come naturally.

Kotchman, the Angels’ top pick in the 2001 draft, is 22. He said he has heard that power is “the last thing that comes” but said he hadn’t consciously altered his swing.

“They’ve just said, go hit,” Kotchman said.

“That’s the thing -- he’ll develop power later in his career,” Erstad said. “It sure looked pretty good to me.”