Angels Treat Themselves to Triple Play, Victory

MINNEAPOLIS —  A Jim Abbott victory and a triple play in the same day? What’s next for the Angels, a season-ending, 19-game win streak and a playoff berth?

“Watch out man, we might go all the way,” Angel second baseman Rex Hudler said after Sunday’s 4-2 victory over the Minnesota Twins, his emotions obscuring reality. “Oh no, here I go again.”

Sure, it was another case of Hudler hysteria, but who can blame him? Watching Sunday’s game unfold in front of 14,378 in the Metrodome, almost anything seemed possible.

Want something rare? Abbott, who has suffered like no other pitcher in baseball this season, gave up eight hits in six innings, struck out three and walked none to earn his first victory since May 2, a span of 129 days.

“It was a great feeling,” Abbott (2-15) said. “It was fun to be part of it.”

Something incredible? With the score tied, 2-2, and runners on first and second in the bottom of the sixth, Minnesota’s Ron Coomer hit a one-hopper right at the third-base bag, where Jack Howell began a 5-4-3 triple play, the first by the Angels since July 23, 1977, the fifth in the 36-year history of the franchise and the third against the Twins.

“We were hoping for a double play there,” Manager Joe Maddon said, “but that sure gave us a lift.”

Something spectacular? With runners on first and second, two outs in the bottom of the seventh and the Angels clinging to a 3-2 lead, Hudler raced into shallow right-center and made a diving, over-the-shoulder catch of Greg Myers’ broken-bat blooper, preserving Abbott’s victory.

Hudler did a somersault after the catch, rolled to his knees and thrust his glove arm triumphantly in the air.

“When I took off for it I told myself, ‘Hud, you need to make this catch.’ ” Hudler said. “Even if you break your neck, it’s worth catching it for Abby. I squeezed it so tight because I didn’t want the ground to cause a fumble. I was so happy, not for me, but for Jim.”

That was the theme of the day for the Angels: Win it for Abbott. Howell snapped the 2-2 tie with a home run to lead off the seventh and began the momentous triple play. “But as exciting as that was, I was really happy Jim got the win,” Howell said. “A lot of neat things happened today.”

Abbott had lost 11 consecutive decisions and was considering retirement before accepting the first minor league assignment of his career, a semi-successful, four-start stint in which the left-hander went 0-2 with a 3.41 earned-run average.

He didn’t return from triple-A Vancouver with a confidence-boosting victory, but he did bring a refreshing new approach to his job.

“Going to the minor leagues may have burst the pressure balloon,” Abbott said. “I realized there’s nothing I can do about things that are out of my control, I just have to throw strikes. I was more concerned with how I threw the ball instead of how I was perceived.”

Another strange thing happened in Vancouver--Abbott began to enjoy the game again.

“I don’t want to put too much significance on this--I just want to enjoy pitching,” he said. “One thing this season has taught me is that you have to have fun, because you don’t know how long you’re going to play this game. All the best games I’ve pitched I’ve had fun. In all the bad ones, I’ve been tentative and worried about results.”

Abbott wasn’t dominant Sunday, but he had good command of his pitches, mixed them well and stayed ahead of hitters. Unlike previous starts, there were very few balls in the dirt or way out of the strike zone. He even got his fastball by a few batters for strikeouts.

Most important, Abbott, who threw only 60 pitches before giving way to reliever Mark Eichhorn to start the seventh, kept his composure. When Minnesota threatened, Abbott didn’t begin sweating. He didn’t brood around the mound or dugout. There were no fatalistic thoughts.

“You could see a little of that old confidence,” shortstop Gary DiSarcina said. “He bore down when he got in trouble, whereas before, his body language would say, ‘Here we go again.’ He was smiling in the dugout . . . there’s a big difference when the pitcher is not all tense and ticked off at himself.”

In addition to the triple play, the Angels backed Abbott with two double plays. DiSarcina also made a diving stop of Pat Meares’ third-inning grounder and threw Meares out from his knees, and Howell fielded Meares’ one-hop smash in the fifth inning flawlessly.

The Angels took a 2-0 lead on RBI singles by Hudler in the third and Garret Anderson in the fourth, but the Twins tied it on Roberto Kelly’s RBI single in the fourth and Marty Cordova’s RBI single in the sixth. After Howell’s homer, the Angels added a ninth-inning run with the help of two Twin errors.

Closer Troy Percival, who hadn’t pitched since Sept. 1, retired six straight in the eighth and ninth for his 34th save, but Hudler, who homered in Abbott’s other 1996 win (3-1 at Oakland), also saved the game--and a few tears.

“If we didn’t win,” Hudler said, “I would have cried tonight.”