Candiotti, Langston Baffling : Baseball: Cleveland knuckleballer pitches 4-2 win over Angels, who can’t figure out their struggling left-hander.

While prized free-agent signee Mark Langston continued to struggle, the Angels on Wednesday knuckled under to Cleveland’s Tom Candiotti.

Candiotti’s superb knuckleball baffled the Angels, but the Indians found Langston easy to read. They got to Langston early, scoring once in the first, twice in the second and once more in the fifth, and Candiotti pitched eight strong innings to record a 4-2 victory over the Angels before 25,543 at Anaheim Stadium.

Langston (3-5) struck out eight in eight innings, but he has won only one of his last six outings, an 8-3 victory over Milwaukee on May 15. All four runs against the 29-year-old left-hander Wednesday were earned, leaving him with an earned-run average of 3.56.

“I’m baffled,” Langston said. “I feel like my last four starts I felt pretty comfortable about everything. I feel like I’m starting to pitch pretty good, and still the results are not there.”

Candiotti (5-2) allowed one run before yielding to Doug Jones, who allowed a ninth-inning home run to Dante Bichette before wrapping up his league-leading 17th save.

In losing, the Angels ended their eight-game home stand with a 6-2 record. They also fell 9 1/2 games behind Oakland in the American League West and two games below .500 at 23-25.

Langston did not appear sharp from the outset. He gave up a home run to Mitch Webster in the first inning, only the second home run he had yielded in 50 2/3 innings, and allowed two more runs in the second as Cleveland built a 3-0 lead.

Webster powered a 1-and-0 pitch into the left-field seats for his fifth home run of the season with one out in the first. The only other home run Langston has given up was hit by Oakland’s Carney Lansford on April 17.

The Indians increased their lead in the second when Chris James and Cory Snyder hit singles and pulled off a double steal as Brook Jacoby struck out. James and Snyder scored on Joel Skinner’s 3-and-2 single, which doubled Skinner’s RBI production for the season. Skinner, catching because Sandy Alomar Jr. has difficulty handling Candiotti’s knuckleball, played only nine games before Wednesday night and had driven in two runs.

The Angels had difficulty hitting Candiotti’s knuckler, but they produced a run in the fourth after two were out. Bichette led off with a single and Donnie Hill walked. Bichette scored on Lance Parrish’s single to left, the first Angel RBI since Wally Joyner’s grand slam in the seventh inning of Sunday’s game against Milwaukee.

The Angels were shut out on Monday and scored both runs Tuesday on double plays, on which the batter does not get an RBI.

Another Indian doubled his RBI total in the fifth, as Cleveland took a 4-1 lead. Felix Fermin led off with a single, moved to second on a wild pitch, to third on a groundout and scored when Tom Brookens dumped a single into right for his second RBI of the season. Brookens was recently activated off the disabled list after recovering from a pulled groin muscle.

The Indians were able to get a runner to third in the sixth, but could not bring him home. Skinner ended the inning by striking out, Langston’s seventh of the game.

Curiously, no Angel struck out against Candiotti’s knuckler until he got Devon White fanned for the second out in the seventh. However, Candiotti was getting the Angels to hit many ground balls, including double plays in the second, fifth and sixth innings. Through seven, he had allowed eight hits and seemed to be in firm command.

Angel Notes

After much speculation, the Angels on Wednesday filed an official complaint with the American League and the commissioner’s office protesting the New Yankees’ actions after the trade in which the Angels acquired Dave Winfield for Mike Witt. The deal was announced on May 11 but wasn’t completed until May 16, after Winfield dropped his challenge to the Yankees’ effort to trade him and agreed to a contract extension with the Angels.

Between the announcement of the trade and Winfield’s agreement with the Angels, Winfield was on the Angels’ 40-man roster. However, Yankee owner George Steinbrenner said that should Winfield take his protest to arbitration and return to the Yankees, he would welcome Winfield back as an everyday player. It is known that those comments angered Angel General Manager Mike Port, although the statement issued by the Angels Wednesday did not cite specific points of contention.

The complaint was filed, Port said in the statement, “in light of facts that Yankee actions and comments subsequent to the announcement of the Dave Winfield transaction were improper and disadvantaged California in its negotiations with Dave Winfield and attempts to finalize the Dave Winfield/Mike Witt transaction. What we intend to pursue may be precedent setting, but we feel the course of the Dave Winfield/Mike Witt transaction warrants precedent-setting action.”

Yankee General Manager Pete Peterson said he was puzzled by the Angels’ action. “I don’t know why they would be protesting. Why would they wait so long?” he said. “I’m a little surprised at this late stage. I don’t know what we did for them to protest it.”

Apparently, Steinbrenner’s intervention is what did it. “Essentially, the matter has nothing to do with Dave Winfield or his representative, Jeff Klein, for we found their conduct to be exemplary through the course of our negotiations,” Port said in the statement. “Unfortunately, we do not feel the same can be said with respect to others who we feel improperly injected themselves into the scenario.”

Brian Downing’s future with the Angels remains unclear. Downing has not appeared in a game since May 19 at Toronto, a stretch that has reached 11 games. That’s his longest absence of the season. Asked how he feels, Downing said, “Don’t ask me. I’m dead. I died a month ago.”