Orioles Get In the Last Shot

The Jeff Mathis emotional roller coaster came to a complete stop in the bottom of the ninth inning Friday night, when Baltimore catcher Ramon Hernandez ended a rare slugfest involving the Angels by hitting a walk-off home run to lift the Orioles to a 6-5 victory in Camden Yards.

What a quick and wild ride it was.

In the bottom of the eighth inning, Mathis, the Angels’ rookie catcher, was charged with a passed ball that enabled Brian Roberts to advance to second base, and Roberts scored on Melvin Mora’s two-out single to right field against reliever Scot Shields to give Baltimore a 5-4 lead.

In the top of the ninth, after Tim Salmon and Casey Kotchman struck out looking, Mathis drove reliever LaTroy Hawkins’ full-count, 95-mph fastball into the left-field seats for his first big league home run -- and the Angels’ fourth homer of the evening. More important, the solo shot tied the score, 5-5.

“I was just trying to make contact,” Mathis said. “I got back to the bench, sat down, and realized what had just happened.”

Mathis’ elation was quickly replaced by dejection. With one out in the bottom of the ninth, Hernandez ripped a full-count Shields fastball into the second row above the left-field wall to give the Orioles their fourth home run and a sudden-death victory.

“It was exciting to tie the game up,” Mathis said, “but disappointing to get left on the field.”

The bitter taste of defeat for Mathis was salted by the eighth-inning passed ball, a Shields fastball that was supposed to sink away from pinch-hitter Luis Matos but tailed so high and inside that Mathis couldn’t even get his glove on it.

The ball hit umpire Terry Davis’ mask and caromed to the screen, allowing Roberts, who singled against reliever J.C. Romero, to take second. Shields referred to the pitch as “a wild pitch,” even though it was correctly ruled a passed ball.

“I don’t think he had a chance at it,” Shields said of Mathis. “It looked pretty high, and it was moving pretty good.”

Mathis’ appreciated the gesture -- Shields’ being a shield -- but he accepted full responsibility for the miscue.

“That’s Scot being a good teammate, not putting it off on someone else,” Mathis said. “I should have caught the ball and not put any more pressure on the pitcher. We’re supposed to keep the ball in front of us. I didn’t make the play.”

Mathis, who was so highly regarded the Angels let two-time Gold Glove winner Bengie Molina go as a free agent to clear room for him, has had a rocky transition from triple A to the big leagues. In his four starts, the Angels are 0-4 and have given up 33 runs.

But Manager Mike Scioscia is by no means ready to give up on Mathis or reduce his role as the Angels’ co-catcher with Jose Molina.

“His makeup is an asset, and we got a touch of it tonight,” Scioscia said. “Everything didn’t go as smoothly as planned -- the passed ball ended up being key -- but he came back in the ninth and tied the game up for us against a tough pitcher. When he settles in, he’ll do some good things for us.”

The Angels did some good things offensively for a short time Friday night. After going 50 innings without a home run, dating to Orlando Cabrera’s two-run shot in the first inning of an April 7 game against the New York Yankees, Garret Anderson (two-run shot) and Juan Rivera (solo) hit consecutive homers against Rodrigo Lopez in the first, and Adam Kennedy hit a solo shot in the second for a 4-0 lead.

But Lopez settled down, giving up only two singles from the third through eighth inning, and the Orioles found their range against Angel starter Ervin Santana, Jay Gibbons hitting a solo homer in the second, David Newhan hitting a solo shot in the fourth and rookie Nick Markakis hitting a two-run homer in the fifth for a 4-4 tie.