A’s End Angels’ Run, 7-5

This might be July, but the emotions had a September feel about them.

Frank Thomas hit a ball that disappeared over the fence, then circled the bases and disappeared into a mob at home plate. The Angels trudged off the field because, well, a walk-off home run means the losing team walks off.

Thomas hit that home run with two out in the ninth inning on Thursday night, off Scot Shields, giving the Oakland Athletics a 7-5 victory. The homer extinguished the Angels’ five-game winning streak and their hope of tying the A’s for first place at the All-Star break.

“This is definitely the team we watch all year long,” Thomas said.

The Angels clinched the division title here in 2004 and 2005. As Thomas hit first base Thursday, Nick Swisher leaped around second, and the Oakland players hopped, skipped and jumped toward home plate.

“Walk-off home runs are real exciting,” the Angels’ Adam Kennedy said. “They have every right to dance around as long as they want.”

With the score tied, 5-5, and one out in the ninth, Shields walked Swisher. One out later, Thomas homered to center field, on a 3-0 pitch.

“It was right down the heart of the plate,” Angels Manager Mike Scioscia said. “Frank didn’t miss it.”

Scioscia said he did not want to concede ball four and move the winning run into scoring position, particularly with Jay Payton on deck.

In his last 22 games, Payton is hitting .361.

Shields said he was aiming the pitch for the outside corner, in the hope of inducing a pop fly.

“He hit it a long ways,” Shields said. “I don’t think that counts as a popup.”

The Angels showed some pop too, tying a season high by hitting four home runs, all solo shots.

Juan Rivera homered twice, for the second time in three days, and Mike Napoli and Vladimir Guerrero homered as well.

But when the Angels needed a clutch hit, they failed. The A’s twice walked Guerrero to get to Garret Anderson. In the first, Anderson flied out and stranded two runners. In the fifth, he grounded out and left the bases loaded.

In the seventh, with the bases loaded and none out, Napoli struck out and Rivera hit into a double play.

Anderson has one hit in his last 15 at-bats, with his average down to .257, its lowest point since April 16. Scioscia said he had not decided whether to give Anderson a night off tonight.

Orlando Cabrera singled twice, extending his streak of reaching base to 63 games.

If he reaches base tonight, he’ll tie Bill Joyce of the 1891 Boston Reds for the fifth-longest streak in major league history.

The Angels and A’s played without incident on Thursday in their first meeting since May 2, when John Lackey and Oakland catcher Jason Kendall were ejected after a benches-clearing brawl.

Lackey yelled at Kendall, saying he leaned over the plate and tried to get hit. Kendall charged the mound in response.

In the ninth inning of that game, J.C. Romero hit Mark Ellis with a pitch. In the bottom of the ninth, Chad Gaudin hit Robb Quinlan with a pitch the Angels believed was retaliatory.

After the game, asked if there was bad blood between the teams, Lackey said, “If there wasn’t before, there is now.”

On Thursday, Scioscia said, “We’ve turned the page on it. We’re going to play baseball.”

Lackey starts tonight. He had little to say about Kendall or that May game, but he said he wasn’t backing away from his comment about the bad blood.

“No,” he said. “We all have good memories.”