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Weaver hurts fingers in dugout

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Times Staff Writer

DETROIT -- Baseball has a long history of freak injuries, from Sammy Sosa hurting his back because of a violent sneeze, to Steve Sparks dislocating his shoulder trying to rip a phone book in half, to Joel Zumaya injuring his wrist playing Guitar Hero, to Hunter Pence sustaining lacerations from walking through a sliding glass door.

Add Jered Weaver to the list, but the Angels right-hander was lucky -- his injury, while certainly the “strangest I’ve ever had on the baseball field,” he said, does not appear to be serious.

Weaver sustained cuts on the tips of the middle and ring fingers of his pitching hand while pushing himself up off the Comerica Park dugout bench during Tuesday night’s game against the Tigers. The cuts were not deep enough to require stitches.

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But the injury did force Angels Manager Mike Scioscia to push back Weaver’s next start, from Friday night at Chicago to Monday night at home against the Yankees.

Dustin Moseley, recalled from triple-A Salt Lake on Tuesday, will start against the White Sox on Friday.

“I went to push to get up and gripped where the staples in the upholstery come together, and it just got me,” Weaver said. “It sliced me pretty good. It felt like a paper cut, but a lot deeper.”

Scioscia said Weaver “shouldn’t have any problem pitching on Monday, but we want to make sure he heals up and throws a little bullpen session.”

Moseley went 7-10 with a 6.94 earned run average in 20 starts for triple-A Salt Lake and is 1-3 with a 7.15 earned-run average in eight games, six of them starts, for the Angels this season.

Close call

X-rays on Mark Teixeira’s right hand, which was hit by a bad-hop grounder in the first inning of Tuesday night’s game, were negative, but Scioscia started the first baseman at designated hitter Wednesday night to give him a break from throwing.

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“It’s just a little bruise,” said Teixeira, who was hit in the palm of the hand. “You always play with bumps and bruises, and this is very, very minor.”

It could have been a whole lot worse. Curtis Granderson’s three-hopper looked like a routine grounder until “the last hop went literally straight for my face,” Teixeira said.

“The only thing I could do was throw my hand up in self-defense. Luckily, it didn’t hit me square between the eyes.”

Teixeira took a grounder to the face while playing at Georgia Tech years ago, “and I didn’t eat solid foods for two days,” he said. “My mouth was so swollen I couldn’t eat.”

Short hops

Entering Wednesday’s game, the Angels had gone from first to third on singles 92 times, most in the major leagues. . . . Six of the Angels’ seven minor league affiliates -- Salt Lake, Arkansas (double A), Cedar Rapids (A), Orem (rookie), Tempe (rookie) and the Dominican Summer League Angels (rookie) -- qualified for postseason play. The only team that didn’t make the playoffs was Class-A Rancho Cucamonga.

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mike.digiovanna@latimes.com

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