Shane Loux and Dustin Moseley are riding the wave

A year ago, Ervin Santana and Joe Saunders came to spring training battling for the final spot in the Angels’ rotation.

But when injuries felled two of the team’s top starters, both made the staff -- and five months later they were both pitching in the All-Star game.

That’s a lesson that isn’t lost on Shane Loux and Dustin Moseley.

“Moseley and I talked about that. We could be this year’s Saunders and Santana,” Loux said.

“Absolutely,” agreed Moseley. “Why can’t we? We had good camps. And both of us are capable of doing it.”

The similarities are striking since one of the two pitchers, like Saunders and Santana before them, seemed certain to start the season in the minors before arm injuries sent Santana and John Lackey to the disabled list last month, opening spots on the roster -- and in the rotation -- for the two right-handers.

Moseley has already made the most of his opportunity, going 1-0 with a 3.86 earned-run average in his two starts. Loux makes his season debut today in Seattle.

“I feel good,” Loux said. “I’m ready. I’ve been looking forward to this for a long time.”

Longer than he expected, as it turns out, since Loux’s first turn in the rotation was to have been last week. That changed early Thursday morning when teammate Nick Adenhart was killed, along with two friends, in a car crash in Fullerton. The game was postponed, pushing Loux’s debut back, and the Angels have been grieving since, particularly Adenhart’s fellow pitchers.

“It’s going to be tough,” Loux said of pitching with Adenhart’s death still fresh in his mind. “Part of being an adult is handling things that come your way.”

The road to the starting rotation was a long one for the 29-year-old Loux.

A second-round pick of Detroit in 1997, Loux made his major league debut in 2002, pitching 14 innings -- and going 0-3 -- for a team that lost 106 games. He appeared in just 11 more games for the Tigers and by 2007 he was out of baseball, having failed in a tryout with the independent Atlantic League.

He was coaching kids at a baseball training facility in Arizona when his boss, calling in a favor from an Angels scout, asked the team to take a look at the pitcher. The club apparently liked what it saw, signing Loux to a minor league contract, and nine months later he was in the Angels bullpen.

“It’s been a pretty crazy ride. From not having a job in ’07 to making the rotation in ‘09,” he said. “It made baseball fun again. You never take anything for granted. [It’s] another day in the big leagues and I realized how cherished those are.”

How many more days he and Moseley will have in the big leagues this season is tough to say. Kelvim Escobar could be ready to join the rotation by the end of the month. Lackey and Santana probably won’t be far behind.

And with Saunders and Jered Weaver pitching well at the top of the rotation, that will give Manager Mike Scioscia and pitching coach Mike Butcher plenty of options, pushing Loux and Moseley to the bullpen or the minors.

Loux understands the math but he’s not conceding anything.

“Our goal is to stay in the rotation for the year,” he said, referring to himself and Moseley. “We want to take care of our own responsibilities and pitch well enough so when that decision time comes . . . we want to make it tough on Scioscia and Butch.”

After all, both pitchers basically forced their way into the rotation with stellar springs, the 27-year-old Moseley going 3-1 with a 3.75 ERA in six starts and Loux splitting two decisions and posting a 4.58 ERA in six appearances.

“I don’t see any added pressure,” said Moseley, a first-round pick of the Reds in the 2000 draft who had made 20 starts and pitched in 61 games for the Angels before this season.

“For most guys, there’s more pressure competing for a job. It’s kind of a relief when you have one, and you can just show what you can do.”

The only Angel who showed more this spring was Adenhart, who went 3-0 with a 3.12 ERA in six spring games, then shut Oakland out for six innings in his first regular-season start. He’s still listed among the major league’s ERA leaders, in fact, and Loux said Adenhart will be with him on the mound in Seattle this afternoon.

“If playing baseball wasn’t everyone’s passion in here, it would be tougher, but we have to understand, this is our job,” he said.

“It’s what we’re here for. It helps us relax, being on the field. It’s the best place for us, to be together and playing baseball.

“It’s not easy, but you have to move on. We have to understand this is our job. You can’t help but draw strength from what happened.”

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kevin.baxter@latimes.com

mike.digiovanna@latimes.com