Angels have nothing left in loss to Orioles

BALTIMORE -- Maybe their arms were tired. And their legs too for that matter.

The Angels feasted on Baltimore pitching for two days, circling the bases at a break-neck pace while amassing 28 runs, 28 hits, including four home runs, and 21 walks to win the first two games of the series handily, but Thursday night, the Orioles cleared the table, crumbs and all.

Converted reliever Jon Leicester, making his second start of the season, blanked the Angels on four hits over 5 2/3 innings, James Hoey, Chad Bradford and Jamie Walker combined for 3 1/3 innings of scoreless relief, and the Orioles supported that pitching with air-tight defense for a 3-0 victory over the Angels at Camden Yards.

“You never expect the offense to go like it did the first two nights,” Angels shortstop Orlando Cabrera said. “You expect to win and to have good at-bats, but you never expect to blow everyone out with 10 or 15 runs. We have a great offense, but things like this happen sometimes when you face guys you haven’t seen before.”

Actually, five players in the Angels’ lineup Thursday night -- Chone Figgins, Vladimir Guerrero, Garret Anderson, Maicer Izturis and Casey Kotchman -- had seen Leicester before, though briefly.

The 28-year-old right-hander threw three innings of scoreless relief for the Chicago Cubs to earn his first major league win in a 6-5, 15-inning victory in Angel Stadium on June 13, 2004, Leicester’s only other appearance against the Angels.

More than three years later, his scoreless streak against the Angels remained intact. Leicester pitched out of one jam and was bailed out of another to improve to 2-1 on a night Angels starter John Lackey pitched well enough to win, allowing three runs and nine hits in seven innings, striking out eight and walking one.

Cabrera and Guerrero singled with one out in the first inning, but Anderson flied to left, and Izturis grounded into a fielder’s choice. With two outs in the sixth, Anderson doubled and Izturis walked, but Hoey got Kotchman to ground out to second. Cabrera (first inning) and Anderson (sixth) were the only two Angels to reach second base against the Orioles.

“Overall, we’ve been all right offensively, but tonight, those guys pitched like night and day from the way they’ve been pitching in this series,” Angels Manager Mike Scioscia said. “Give Leicester credit. He has a live arm, and he came after us in the strike zone early. We had a shot to take the lead in the first inning and couldn’t.”

The Angels hold an 8 1/2 -game lead in the American League West over Seattle, which won Thursday night. The Angels’ magic number is nine.

Lackey’s chances for win No. 17 seemed good considering the way the Angels were hitting, the way the Orioles were playing, and the fact that three Baltimore regulars, shortstop Miguel Tejada, third baseman Melvin Mora and catcher Ramon Hernandez, were not in the lineup.

But the Orioles used a pair of doubles by Jay Payton and Scott Moore and an RBI single by Tike Redman, a hit Lackey called “a 10-hopper up the middle,” to score two runs in the second inning. Aubrey Huff singled in the sixth, took third on Payton’s single and scored on Moore’s sacrifice fly to make it 3-0 in the sixth.

“There’s only so much you can do, man,” said Lackey, who fell to 16-9. “I felt pretty good. I felt they got about the max they could get out of me.”

Lackey was among the front-runners for the AL Cy Young Award two weeks ago, but the Angels bullpen blew late-inning leads in his two previous starts, turning potential wins into no-decisions, and Thursday, he got no run support for only the second time in 30 starts this season.

“It’s a shame that we can’t score when he pitches, because he always keeps us in the game,” Cabrera said of Lackey. “We all want him to have a chance of winning the Cy Young. We feel pretty bummed about it.”

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