Escobar Gets Some Support

SEATTLE — As if the Seattle Mariners haven’t been demoralized enough this season -- they trail the American League West-leading Oakland Athletics by 31 games -- Angel right-hander Kelvim Escobar added to their misery Monday night.

Escobar gave up one run and six hits in seven innings to lead the Angels to a 5-1 victory over the Mariners in front of 30,432 in Safeco Field, keeping the Angels two games behind the A’s in the West and moving them within 4 1/2 games of the idle Boston Red Sox in the AL wild-card race with 19 games remaining.

“It’s nice to come to the park in a pennant race,” said Escobar, the former Toronto Blue Jay pitcher. “I don’t think I’ve ever been in a race before.”

Escobar should buckle up, because it could be a wild ride. As he addressed reporters after Monday night’s game, the Oakland-Texas game was on the clubhouse television, the teams deadlocked after nine innings.

The Rangers took a 6-5 lead in the top of the 10th, giving the Angels hope they would trim Oakland’s lead to one game. But the A’s rallied for two runs in the bottom of the inning for a 7-6 victory, maintaining their two-game cushion.

“We only have three weeks left, and everyone knows how well Oakland has been playing,” Escobar said. “We can’t give much.”

Escobar gave nearly nothing, striking out seven and walking one, and center fielder Garret Anderson provided the key offensive blow, a three-run home run that gave the Angels a 4-0 lead in the third inning.

Escobar improved to 10-10 and joined Bartolo Colon, Jarrod Washburn and John Lackey in the 10-victory club, marking the first time since 1991 (Chuck Finley, Mark Langston, Jim Abbott and Kirk McCaskill) that the Angels have had four pitchers with 10 wins or more.

“We know we had that kind of potential,” Manager Mike Scioscia said of the pitching staff. “We’re at a point where this is the best rotation we’ve had since we’ve been here in 2000. Hopefully, the guys will keep it going the last few weeks of the season.”

Escobar’s fastball hit 97 mph on occasion, but most of his strikeouts came on changeups and split-fingered fastballs that were in the 84-mph range. He so frustrated the Mariners that catcher Miguel Olivo, after striking out with a runner on third to end the fourth, snapped his bat in half over his knee. Seattle went 0 for 11 with runners in scoring position.

And in a sure sign of a dominant performance against the Mariners, Escobar held Ichiro Suzuki, who is on pace to break George Sisler’s major league season hit record, hitless in three at-bats, walking him in the first inning and inducing groundouts in the third, fifth and seventh innings.

Reliever Francisco Rodriguez retired Suzuki on a groundout in the ninth, leaving the speedy leadoff batter hitless for the second time in four games. He has 231 hits.

“It’s not easy pitching to Ichiro at all, because he can hit anything, low, in, up, away,” catcher Bengie Molina said. “I guess we got lucky tonight because he hit it right at people.”

The Angels didn’t, for a change -- at least when Escobar is pitching. Escobar has received the least support of any Angel starter, the team scoring an average of 3.86 runs in his first 28 games.

The Angels have been shut out seven times this season, four of those coming in Escobar’s starts, including a 1-0 loss to Toronto last Wednesday night, a game in which Escobar gave up five hits and struck out 12 in eight innings.

But the Angels gave Escobar plenty to work with Monday night, scoring once in the second on doubles by Jose Guillen and Molina and three in the third on Anderson’s home run.

David Eckstein opened the third with a walk, and Vladimir Guerrero’s one-out single moved Eckstein to second. Anderson then crushed a 1-and-1 pitch from Cha Seung Baek to right field for his 13th homer and fifth in his last 17 games.

The Angels extended the lead to 5-0 in the seventh when Adam Kennedy walked and Eckstein executed a perfect hit-and-run single through the vacated second base hole to move Kennedy to third. Chone Figgins struck out, but Guerrero hit a grounder to second to drive in Kennedy with his 111th run batted in.