Collins Doesn’t Question Team’s Style

Shortstop Gary DiSarcina walked into the swing of George Hendrick’s fungo bat in his first spring training workout and broke a bone in his left forearm. Center fielder Jim Edmonds, his right shoulder worn from years of crashing into walls and diving onto the turf, had surgery to repair torn cartilage.

Mo Vaughn, just two batters into his Angel career, tumbled into a dugout in pursuit of a foul pop on opening night and suffered a severely sprained left ankle. Right fielder Tim Salmon sprained his left wrist while attempting a sliding catch on May 3 and hasn’t played since.

But when left fielder Mike Colangelo had to be taken off the field on a stretcher after his seventh-inning collision with center fielder Reggie Williams Sunday night, Manager Terry Collins did not assume a here-we-go-again or woe-is-me attitude.

“You say to yourself, ‘What can you change? What are we missing?’ ” Collins said. “But when you look back at all these injuries, they’re not through a lack of training. With the exception of Gary’s, which was a fluke, they’re because of aggressiveness.

“Salmon and Edmonds dive for balls, and even if we had a railing up in front of the dugout, Mo would have crashed into it. I wouldn’t want those guys to change. These things happen. It’s just that our injuries cost us a lot of time.

“I don’t care what people say. These guys play the game the right way, 100%, and you can’t ask for anything more than that.”

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There’s out of sight, out of mind, and then there’s outfielder Matt Luke, who admittedly “fell off the face of the Earth” for a few months this season. In fact, when Collins was asked in early May how Luke was doing, he replied: “I have no idea.”

Luke missed most of spring training because of a lower back injury and spent six weeks at extended spring training in Mesa, Ariz. Expected to provide the Angels with a potent left-handed bat off the bench, all Luke brought was a shroud of mystery.

Then on June 5, after his medication and rehabilitation exercises began making baseball more bearable, Luke was sent to triple-A Edmonton. A week later, after hitting .429 with five home runs and 15 runs batted in in six games, Luke was back. “I went [to Edmonton] with a goal to show I didn’t belong there and that I was healthy,” said Luke, a former Dodger. “That was as motivated as I’ve ever been in my career.”

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With Orlando Palmeiro on second and two outs in the 10th inning Sunday night, Arizona intentionally walked Vaughn. Collins pulled Vaughn for pinch-runner Steve Sparks, which seemed like an odd move considering Vaughn’s run meant nothing. But Collins said he wanted more speed at first “to make sure they had to throw the ball across the infield if a ball was hit into the shortstop hole.” Garret Anderson struck out to end the inning, though, and Vaughn’s spot came up to lead off the 13th, which pinch-hitter Jeff Huson opened with a groundout. . . . DiSarcina completed the Lake Elsinore portion of his rehabilitation assignment Sunday, going 0 for 4 with three groundouts, a lineout and three assists. DiSarcina went one for 12 in four games for the Storm and is scheduled to join double-A Erie (Pa.) today. . . . The Angels and Diamondbacks combined for eight double plays in the first nine innings Sunday, a major league high for 1999.