Leftwich Sharp in Angel Debut : Baseball: Rookie gives up one run in seven innings, but that’s one more than Welch. A’s win, 2-1.

There were no bottles of champagne awaiting. He wasn’t soaked in beer Thursday night, with his teammates celebrating his first major league victory.

No, there will be plenty of time for that later. This night, Angel starter Phil Leftwich merely had to settle for the accolades that were coming from every direction in his major league debut.

Leftwich will go down in the box score as the losing pitcher in the Oakland Athletics’ 2-1 victory over the Angels, but the crowd of 22,132 at Anaheim Stadium believe they might might have witnessed something special.

Leftwich, 24, making the finest debut of any Angel rookie pitcher this season, yielded seven hits and one run in seven innings, never walking a batter and striking out three.

“I thought the first time I’d be so nervous, I couldn’t see straight,” Leftwich said. “I actually had more fun than I thought I would.”

Leftwich, replacing Scott Sanderson in the rotation, looked like a veteran. He never appeared in awe, and treated each batter as if he was another pimple-faced kid in the minors.

“I liked everything he did tonight,” Angel Manager Buck Rodgers said. “He had a good moving fastball. He went at them well (throwing 66 strikes in 101 pitches).”

Even Oakland starter Bob Welch (8-7), who shut out the Angels for seven innings before turning the game over to the A’s bullpen, was quite impressed. “He didn’t look like a kid just making his big league debut, that’s for sure,” Welch said.

Said Angel left fielder Luis Polonia: “He was outstanding, man. It was fun to watch him pitch. I had never heard about the guy, didn’t know anything about him, but he was excellent.

“He’s not afraid, that’s for sure.”

Perhaps the only one in the ballpark who wasn’t surprised by Leftwich’s performance was Angel rookie first baseman Ty Van Burkleo. He was Leftwich’s teammate the entire time at triple-A Vancouver, and was there the day Leftwich’s season turned around.

“I was at this Little League clinic in Vancouver,” Van Burkleo said, “and Phil shows up. I said, ‘What are you doing here, aren’t you pitching tonight?’

“He said, ‘Yeah, but the last time I did one of these clinics, I pitched great.’ ”

There was a pause in the conversation, and then Leftwich said something, Van Burkleo said, “that I’ll never forget.”

“He told me, ‘You know something, I’ve got this feeling I’m not going to lose for a long, long time.’ ”

Leftwich promptly went 5-1, yielding a 1.44 earned-run average in his next nine starts.

It took only only one batter for the Angel crowd to become enamored of Leftwich. Any time you can make Rickey Henderson look foolish at the plate, you can make a lot of friends in this game.

“Rickey’s one of the premier ballplayers in the league,” Rodgers said, “but he’s also a guy that you’d love to wring his neck.”

Henderson strutted to the plate eager to face this rookie. He looked to the mound, glared at Leftwich, and watched a first pitch for a strike. Then he watched a second.

Henderson stepped out of the batter’s box, slapped the bat against his spikes, and began to take Leftwich seriously. Leftwich fired, Henderson swung and missed, and the crowd had a new hero.

Leftwich wound up retiring the first seven batters he faced before Craig Paquette’s single to center and didn’t run into trouble until the sixth inning.

Brent Gates opened the sixth with a sharp bouncer to the mound. Leftwich caught it with his bare hand and threw to first for the out. Trainer Rick Smith and Rodgers immediately rushed to the mound to examine Leftwich’s right hand. Leftwich shrugged it off, saying he was fine.

Ruben Sierra slapped a single to center and stole second. Troy Neel singled to center, scoring Sierra. Leftwich got out of the inning without any further damage.

Actually, it could have easily been a four-run deficit without rookie right fielder Tim Salmon’s spectacular catch in the third inning that robbed Gates of a three-run homer. Gates slammed Leftwich’s pitch over the right-field fence, but Salmon, running at full speed, came out of nowhere. He ran to the fence, leaped, braced his right hand on the fence, and snared the ball.

“I’m really impressed with that guy,” Oakland Manager Tony La Russa said. “It’s just not just the offensive and defensive skills, he carries himself like a big leaguer.”