Angels’ Ervin Santana not receiving offensive support
Reporting from Chicago — Ervin Santana smiled when he could have smirked. He chuckled when he could have cried.
The Angels’ starter has pitched at least eight innings in each of his last two starts, compiling a 2.76 earned-run average.
He’s also 0-2 in that span.
A pair of stellar starts has been obscured by his team’s lingering offensive woes, but a nearly jovial Santana seemed to be making the best of it Thursday at U.S. Cellular Field following the Angels’ 1-0 loss to the Chicago White Sox.
“I know we’re doing our best to score runs,” said Santana, who allowed one run in eight innings. “We didn’t get the job done but it’s all right. We have another game tomorrow.”
The Angels have averaged only 3.6 runs over their last 17 games, and their seven victories in that stretch were largely a function of outstanding starting pitching.
“Our pitching is doing great. Our pitching is awesome,” center fielder Torii Hunter said. “But offensively, we’re just not playing the way we’re capable of playing. We’re just going through the motions. … You don’t even have to look at numbers; you can just feel it.”
Santana’s numbers are on the upswing. He has pitched at least 6 2/3 innings and allowed four earned runs or fewer in each of his last four starts.
“Ervin has been as consistent as any pitcher in our league for the last six or seven starts,” Manager Mike Scioscia said.
Veterans’ day off
Scioscia gave Hideki Matsui and Bobby Abreu the day off, saying he wanted his slumping veterans to “mentally take a little breather and go from there.”
Matsui is hitting only .200 this month, with no extra-base hits in 20 at-bats. The designated hitter is batting .253 overall with a .334 on-base percentage and .404 slugging percentage, all figures that put him on pace to establish career lows for his eight years in the major leagues.
Abreu has just five hits in his last 55 at-bats, dropping his average from .272 to .250.
Scioscia said he considered using Matsui or Abreu as a pinch-hitter with two outs in the seventh inning and Cory Aldridge at the plate with the bases empty and the Angels trailing by a run, “but Cory has as much power as anyone on the team and has a chance to get an extra-base hit or drive the ball.”
Aldridge struck out swinging to end the inning.
Heightened alert
Major League Baseball had warned the Angels about the possibility of riots in Oakland this weekend before a former transit police officer was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the shooting of an unarmed man, ending a racially charged trial that had been moved to Los Angeles.
Johannes Mehserle, who is white, fired a single round into the back of Oscar J. Grant III, who was black and lying face-down on the station platform during the New Year’s Day 2009 incident at an Oakland train station.
The Angels are staying at a San Francisco hotel and traveling by bus to Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum for the three-game series that starts Friday, said traveling secretary Tom Taylor.
Outfielder Reggie Willits said no one in the organization had addressed players about the possibility of riots.
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