Tim Belcher

In the first inning of his first game as an Angel, Mo Vaughn tumbled down the dugout steps at Edison Field and wrenched his ankle. Angel curse? Vaughn scoffed at the notion. But Tim Belcher believes. Before he joined the Angels in 1999, he had pitched at least 200 innings in each of the preceding three seasons and at least 150 innings in each of his 11 years in the major leagues.

A giant bee swarm congregated around home plate in the middle of the fifth inning Saturday, causing a five-minute delay in an exhibition game between the Angels and San Diego Padres at the Peoria Sports Complex. "Where were they in the third inning?" Angel pitcher Tim Belcher cracked. The veteran right-hander could have used such a delay--anything to break up a 30-pitch inning in which he was stung for six runs on six hits, including three-run homers by Damian Jackson and Bubba Trammell.

There's an old baseball saying that when a pitcher is contemplating retirement, the hitters will usually make the decision for him. Those batters spoke loudly and clearly this spring to Angel right-hander Tim Belcher, who took his cue and walked away from the game Saturday, ending a distinguished 14-year big league career that began with the Dodgers. "My last two starts, I had a few guys 0-2, and they fouled off two or three of my maximum-effort pitches like it was nothing," Belcher, 39, said.

As a longtime fan, season-ticket holder and past president of the Angels, I expect honesty when the team deals with the fans and the press. I did no less during my tenure. However, recent statements from Bill Stoneman, a capable and respected "baseball man," to the effect that " . . . without any additional acquisitions and if the team remains healthy," he expects the Angels to contend insult my intelligence. Defense wins championships and in baseball, defense includes pitching. You will not win with Ken Hill and Tim Belcher as the aces of the staff.

Manager Mike Scioscia said the reports on Tim Belcher, who has given up one hit and struck out eight in eight innings of two rehabilitation starts for Class-A Lake Elsinore, have been "very encouraging." Belcher will make the first of three scheduled starts for triple-A Edmonton on Tuesday, and if he continues to progress in his recovery from winter elbow surgery, Scioscia will have a difficult decision in about two weeks. Whose rotation spot will Belcher take?

After giving up only one run and five hits in five innings of a triple-A rehabilitation start Tuesday, Tim Belcher said he was throwing the ball better this month than he did at any time last season. That all changed after Thursday's bullpen workout. Belcher, who had elbow surgery in November, experienced some soreness in his arm and was scratched from today's scheduled start for Edmonton.

Manager Mike Scioscia insists Tim Belcher is only going through "a dead-arm phase," that the veteran right-hander has not re-injured the elbow he had surgically repaired last November. Although the Angels do not consider Belcher's setback serious, attempts to prepare him for his return do not appear to be going very well.

The young starting pitchers have done a remarkable job of keeping the Angels in games and in the division race, but no matter how well Seth Etherton, Brian Cooper and Jarrod Washburn perform, they cannot bring to the mound what Tim Belcher brought Saturday night.

The Angels' starting pitching, from the vantage point of an increasingly hazy winter: young, and not very good. Old, and not very good. Injured, and not very good. For Tim Belcher, that was two out of three. But, even at 38 and coming off arm surgery, the old man did the Angels proud Thursday, pitching six strong innings in a 4-3 victory over the Kansas City Royals at Edison Field. The Angels were supposed to be buried by now, crushed beneath an avalanche of opposing runs.