This Team Has Finally Found a Little Magic

One magic shrinks. Another magic grows.

The Angels moved within one night of securing a playoff reservation, doing so with the sweet knowledge that their deposit is already there.

The magic number is two. The magic feeling is true.

You could feel it in the cool McAfee Coliseum air Monday, in John Lackey’s bending strikes, in Steve Finley’s looping swing and Mike Scioscia’s winded sprint.

Yeah, Scioscia can still, occasionally, when prodded, sprint.

Like we said, magic.

“We’ve definitely had to grind it out this year, there hasn’t been that feeling that we had in past years,” said the manager. “But I sense it coming back.”

Back, in the form of a 4-3 victory over a chasing Oakland Athletics team that admitted it could not lose.

Back, a five-game lead with six games remaining, the champagne being rolled into the tunnel and Arte Moreno jumping on an airplane with a victory tonight clinching the American League West title.

Back, with familiar faces, new twists and, finally, a familiar story line.

“We have not played at the consistently high level that we were at in 2002,” Scioscia said. “But I’m starting to see signs that we can have the same results.”

Those signs began popping up last week when the Angels crammed in seven comeback victories during an eight-game win streak.

On Monday, in front of a tiny crowd that cheered for the scoreboard operator to show a football video, those signs were as clear as an empty seat.

There was Lackey, pitching as well as he did during the final months of the title year, only with bushier hair and a veteran’s scowl.

Back then, he was mostly fastball. These days, he also has a curve that left the A’s weak-kneed and whining.

Third inning, bases loaded, two out, Mark Kotsay up ... and down. Three curveballs, one strikeout.

“He was huge,” Scioscia said.

There was the bullpen, the league’s best since Kelvim Escobar dropped in unannounced.

Taking over for Lackey in the seventh inning Monday, Escobar gave up a homer in two innings, then sat down to watch Frankie Rodriguez fool the A’s into a grounder and two strikeouts to finish it.

“Every time I take the mound, it feels like the playoffs to me,” Rodriguez said.

Then there was the thing that pulls it all together, the league’s best defense, highlighted by Chone Figgins’ quick throw and Darin Erstad’s scooping catch of Jay Payton’s slow grounder in the ninth.

“Our pitching and defense has been solid ... no, that’s too vanilla, they have been terrific,” said Scioscia, refusing vanilla for one of the first times in his career.

There was also an appearance by the endangered power-hitting of

He has been awful this year, bad hacks, poor numbers, an aging game. But now that it really counts, well, he drove a Joe Blanton pitch over the right-field fence for his second homer in his last three starts.

Just like last year with the Dodgers. Not at all a coincidence.

“This is the fun time of year for me,” Finley said.

Then there was, finally, that rare visible Scioscia fire.

The manager never makes much of a scene during games. For him, an act of inspirational spontaneity consists of taking off his red jacket.

“As a manager, you have to detach yourself from the emotion and remain calm,” Scioscia said. “It’s difficult at time. It’s very difficult at times.”

To be politely vanilla about it, this would count as one of those times.

That was Scioscia sprinting out to center field in the sixth inning after Vladimir Guerrero’s fly ball was caught by Kotsay, then dropped when Kotsay was transferring the ball to his throwing hand.

It was properly ruled an out, but Scioscia had to be sure.

Later in the game, he charged down the third base line to argue that a Guerrero foul grounder had hit third base and should have been ruled fair. In that case, he was right.

That means he was batting .500, which is about twice as much as his team has hit under pressure during most of this season.

“We’ve gone from a scary lineup to a scrappy lineup,” hitting coach Mickey Hatcher said. “It’s been a lot different around here this year.”

With Troy Glaus’ departure, Tim Salmon’s injury, Garret Anderson’s aches and Finley’s slide, the Angels have lost their ability to create the dramatic.

“I was asking guys the other day, what are some of the magical highlights of this season?” Hatcher said. “And they couldn’t think of anything. I’m thinking, good luck to whoever is putting together that highlight video, it’s going to be hard finding enough stuff.”

But this time of year, grinding is good. Grinding wins games. And grinding can even be, well, magical, as the Angels showed in the second inning.

Guerrero reached second base on a bad throw from shortstop Crosby. Erstad scored him with a double.

Molina moved Erstad to third on a grounder. Finley trapped him off third with another grounder, but Finley was able to race to second on the rundown. From there, Finley scored on Juan Rivera’s single.

Grinding. Painstaking. October bound.

“I’m very comfortable this time of year,” said Rivera, his team but one night from a playoff spot, finally wrapped in a playoff vibe.

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Bill Plaschke can be reached at bill.plaschke@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Plaschke, go to latimes.com/plaschke.