Better Late Than Never for the Angels

It had been a day of distractions for the Angels. And a night of frustration.

After learning that reliever Brendan Donnelly had been suspended for 10 days and Manager Mike Scioscia for one as a result of Tuesday’s controversial game against the Washington Nationals, the Angels struggled much of Friday evening to catch the Florida Marlins.

They did so with a run in the ninth and then won, 3-2, in the 11th when Jeff DaVanon lined a full-count pitch from reliever Jim Mecir into right-center field to send an Angel Stadium sellout crowd of 43,767 home happy.

“When you’re hitting what I am,” said DaVanon, who raised his average to .226 with the hit, “anything like that can give you some confidence. He [Mecir] usually throws me a lot of screwballs. He just left one up this time.”

Scioscia had to watch the game from his office, banished there because of the suspension. Bench coach Joe Maddon served as acting manager.

“You’re thinking like you’re still managing,” Scioscia said afterward. “It’s frustrating that you can’t be on the bench, but exhilarating when you get a [game-winning] hit like that.”

Reliever Scot Shields (6-4) got the win and Mecir (1-2) took the loss.

Vladimir Guerrero scored the winning run after opening the inning with a single to left and moving to second when Steve Finley was hit by a pitch.

Angel starter Jarrod Washburn was in trouble nearly from the beginning. With one out in the first, he surrendered back-to-back singles to Luis Castillo and Miguel Cabrera. Then Carlos Delgado hit a liner to left that looked as if it might fall in.

But Chone Figgins dived, caught the ball and, while still on his knees, was able to make a strong throw to second to double up Castillo.

Completing a double play of his own, Figgins then led off the bottom of the first with his fifth home run of the year, his second to open a game. The second pitch thrown by starter Brian Moehler carried over the right-field wall.

In the third, Washburn threw a pitch that even Figgins couldn’t get back. After Castillo’s one-out double, Cabrera smacked a 1-2 pitch over the wall in left-center to put Florida in front.

The Angels came with a step of tying the game in the fifth. With Kennedy on second via a single and stolen base, Darin Erstad hit a fly to short center. Marlin center fielder Juan Pierre, who has a can-you-top-this rivalry with close friend Figgins, did a diving act of his own, securing the ball as he hit the grass.

Erstad extended his hitting streak to a career-high 17 games with an eighth-inning single, and the Angels finally caught the Marlins in the ninth.

Garret Anderson opened with a ground-rule double that bounced over the low wall in the right-field corner. After Finley sacrificed him to third, the Marlins moved their infield in.

The strategy seemed to work perfectly when Bengie Molina hit a sharp grounder to shortstop Alex Gonzalez. Anderson was halfway home when Gonzalez fired the ball at catcher Paul Lo Duca.

A misfire, however, as it turned out.

The ball was wide of the mark, glancing off Lo Duca’s outstretched glove, allowing Anderson to trot the rest of the way to the plate with the tying run.

Distractions? What distractions?

DaVanon said the suspensions were not a factor in the game.

“We can’t do anything but play baseball,” he said.

After the game, the Angels recalled infielder Maicer Izturis from triple-A Salt Lake, where he had been on a rehab assignment, and optioned infielder Robb Quinlan to Salt Lake.