Race Heats Up for Anderson

MINNEAPOLIS — There will be no race for the Angels this September, but there will be one for their star left fielder. With 24 games left in the season, Garret Anderson leads the race for the American League batting championship.

Anderson moved into the league lead Tuesday in an otherwise forgettable 12-6 loss to the Minnesota Twins. The leader board shows Anderson tied with Derek Jeter of the New York Yankees at .322, but the full percentages show Anderson at .32194 and Jeter at .32178.

This race is the tightest in baseball, with Boston’s Bill Mueller and Cleveland’s Milton Bradley at .321, Boston’s Nomar Garciaparra at .320, Chicago’s Magglio Ordonez at .319, Seattle’s Ichiro Suzuki and Texas’ Hank Blalock at .318 and Boston’s Manny Ramirez at .317.

But they’re all chasing Anderson, in a season in which the batting title would cap a triple crown of sorts, following his victory in the All-Star game home run derby and his All-Star game most-valuable-player award.

“It’d be superb,” Angel coach Joe Maddon said. “It would be the culmination of so many good things that have happened for him.”

Anderson ranks second in the league in runs batted in, 10 behind Toronto’s Carlos Delgado. Given the choice, the Angels’ primary cleanup hitter said he would prefer the RBI title over the batting title.

“That’s what they’re paying me to do,” Anderson said. “That’s my position in the lineup. It wouldn’t do our team any good if I hit .350 with 80 RBIs. It would if I hit .280 with 130 RBIs. That would mean I did my job well.

“But, sure, it would be cool to win a batting title.”

The magnitude of the accomplishment would be magnified by the fact that Anderson does not play the game of the traditional batting champion. He does not bunt, seldom beats out an infield hit and swings at lots of bad balls.

“If he can truly do it with the number of times he walks, you’d really see how pure a hitter he is,” Maddon said.

In April, as Anderson kept his average above .400 for the first three weeks of the season, he insisted he could not win a batting title. He is surprised to find himself atop the leader board in September, albeit with an average that would be the lowest for an AL batting champion since 1972, when one of his mentors, Rod Carew, hit .318 for the Twins. In 1970, Alex Johnson won the Angels’ only batting title, at .329.

“Every year, you anticipate guys hitting .350,” Anderson said. “A guy like Ichiro, his job is to hit singles and get on base. There’s a big difference in those types of hitters. That’s what made what Frank [Thomas] did all those years so special.”

In Tuesday’s game, the Twins routed Aaron Sele for nine runs in 2 2/3 innings. He failed to retire nine of the final 12 batters he faced, and he has won once in his last nine starts. His earned-run average is 5.88 overall and 8.58 since Aug. 1, and his post-operative year is ending poorly.

Manager Mike Scioscia traced the problem to an erratic delivery, not a weak shoulder.

“The only criteria for Aaron being shut down is if his shoulder is taking a pounding that’s going to set him back for next year,” Scioscia said. “That’s not the case.”

Scioscia said the Angels have considered reinstating the five-inning limit for Sele in three starts, earlier this season, when he gave up one run in 15 innings.

“Right now, it wouldn’t have mattered,” Scioscia said.

Sele is adamantly opposed to that limit. When asked whether he considered his success on the five-inning limit a coincidence, he said, “Totally.”

“The more innings you throw, the more pitches you get. It’s always better to throw more innings,” he said. “I’ve programmed myself for a long year. It’s been a long year.”