Mariners Cash In on Lackey

It was a game that almost defied explanation for the Angels, who were supposed to ride their starting pitching, defense and bullpen to contention in the American League West but suffered major breakdowns in all three areas in Tuesday night’s 10-8 loss to the Seattle Mariners in Safeco Field.

John Lackey, who worked into the sixth inning or later in 30 of 33 starts during his breakthrough 2005 season, lasted about as long as it took the ink on the three-year, $17.01-million contract he signed Monday to dry, giving up five runs during a 38-pitch second inning and getting pulled after four.

An Angel team that led the league in fielding percentage last season and looked even better defensively this season committed four errors, more than they made in any game in 2005, which helped the Mariners score two unearned runs.

And reliever Esteban Yan, who did not give up a run in 10 2/3 spring-training innings and seemed to work his way back into Manager Mike Scioscia’s good graces after spending most of 2005 in a mop-up role, gave up a game-breaking three-run home run to Richie Sexson in the eighth, turning a 6-5 Seattle lead into 9-5.

Second baseman Adam Kennedy’s throwing error on Adrian Beltre’s ensuing routine grounder led to another run that gave the Mariners a 10-5 lead.

“It was not a very well-played game by us, and it’s tough to expect to win when you don’t play very well,” Kennedy said. “You try not to have many nights like these, but they happen.”

As ugly as it was for the Angels, they still brought the potential tying run to the plate in the ninth, after Garret Anderson’s three-run home run in the sixth and Juan Rivera’s two-run shot in the eighth had turned a 6-0 deficit into a 6-5 game.

Tim Salmon led off the ninth with a home run against closer Eddie Guardado, Salmon’s first homer since April, 24, 2004, at Oakland, and his first career pinch-hit homer. Chone Figgins walked and Vladimir Guerrero’s one-out, run-scoring single pulled the Angels within 10-7.

Anderson grounded out and Rivera’s run-scoring double to right-center field made it 10-8, but Guardado, on his 40th pitch of a near-disastrous inning, got Darin Erstad to fly to right field to end the game.

“We kept battling, but we couldn’t play good-enough defense or make enough key pitches to minimize the damage,” Scioscia said. “It was very uncharacteristic of us to have those miscues.”

Two late-game decisions by Scioscia also backfired. The first was to summon Yan in the eighth inning of a one-run game instead of Brendan Donnelly, or perhaps J.C. Romero. Scot Shields was warming up but would have only entered had the Angels tied the score in the eighth.

The second was to have Yan intentionally walk Raul Ibanez with a runner on second to face Sexson, the cleanup batter who had 39 homers and 121 runs batted in last season.

The same move worked in the fourth inning, when Lackey walked Ibanez to load the bases and struck out Sexson and Beltre to end the inning, but this time Sexson tore into a Yan fastball, lining it over the wall in left-center field for a three-run home run and a 9-5 lead.

“That was 180 degrees from the way Yan has been pitching,” Scioscia said. “He just didn’t make good pitches to Richie, and it cost him. We were confident when we gave him the ball that he would hold the game where it was. Unfortunately, it went the other way.”

Lackey’s start went south quickly. The Mariners tagged the right-hander for five hits in the second, an inning that started with Kenji Johjima’s one-out home run to left, the catcher’s second in as many games.

Jeremy Reed and Yuniesky Betancourt singled, and Ichiro Suzuki was hit by a pitch to load the bases. Jose Lopez grounded a two-run single to left for a 3-0 lead, and while Ibanez was up, Hector Carrasco began warming up in the Angel bullpen.

Ibanez grounded out, but Sexson lined a two-run single to right-center field for a 5-0 lead, the first time since July 9 that Lackey gave up five runs in an inning.

“No excuses, I just threw a couple of bad pitches,” Lackey said. “The contract has nothing to do with anything anymore. It’s time to pitch. The stuff is fine, and it’s going to get better. I just made some bad pitches.”