AN ANGEL EMERGES GLAUS' NINTH-INNING HOMER SINKS DODGERS ANGELS 6, DODGERS 4.

Byline: Gordon Verrell Staff Writer

Troy Glaus' thinking when he stepped to the plate in the bottom of the ninth inning Sunday was reasonably simple.

``I had a job to do,'' the Angels third baseman said. ``I was trying to get a broken-bat single, anything.

Glaus did a little better than that. He crushed Jeff Shaw's 0-1 pitch into the left-center-field seats, placing an indelible exclamation point on the Angels' four-run rally that lifted them to a dramatic 6-4 win over the Dodgers in front of 43,001 stunned fans at Edison Field.

``It was something we needed,'' Glaus said.

The two-run homer was something he needed just as well. Glaus had been hitless in the series (0 for 11), he was hitless in 17 at-bats against the Dodgers this season, and he had just two hits his previous 30 at-bats overall. But, finally, he came through, enabling the Angels to claim their second successive interleague Freeway Series win against the Dodgers, 2-1.

The loss dropped the Dodgers into a tie with San Francisco, five games behind Arizona in the National League West.

Thirty times in the 32 games the Dodgers have led after eight innings this season, they've come away successful. The prime reason, of course, is the redoubtable Shaw, who had converted 19 of 21 save opportunities and was tied for the NL lead in saves.

But, last week against the Angels, Shaw failed to protect a one-run lead in the ninth, although it wasn't so much his doing; there was a Dodgers error that led to the tying run, a game the Angels won in the 10th. This time he took over with a two-run lead. He got the first out, but he couldn't get anybody else.

David Eckstein worked Shaw for a one-out walk. Left-handed hitter Adam Kennedy deftly went to left field for a single. Then Darin Erstad, another left-hander, sliced a double into the left-field corner to knock in the tying runs.

Glaus was next and, after a wild swing on Shaw's first pitch, drove the second one into the seats for his 18th home run of the season.

``You're not going to hold him down forever,'' Dodgers manager Jim Tracy said of the former UCLA star. ``You hate to see him come up in a situation where he can beat you.''

Of course, Tracy might have elected to pass on Glaus - the Dodgers had already walked him 10 times in six games. But that would have brought up Garret Anderson, who's already personally beat the Dodgers three times this season, twice with home runs, and it was his two-out RBI single in the first inning that gave the Angels a brief 1-0 lead.

But that didn't hold for long as the Dodgers jumped on a struggling Pat Rapp for four runs in the second, three on Paul Lo Duca's eighth home run and his second in as many games.

``It was a 3-1 pitch up around his neck, and he took it out,'' said Rapp, who ended up working six innings and, ultimately, was spared his eighth loss in nine decisions. ``After that, I was able to pitch the way I wanted.''

But the Angels continued to misfire. They left two on in the third inning, and they managed just one run on three hits in the seventh when they got to within 4-2. Glaus grounded out to leave runners on first and third in the seventh, but he got even in the ninth.

``Troy is that kind of hitter,'' Angels manager Mike Scioscia said. ``He's very dangerous ... and he never quits. He pulled his head on (Shaw's) first pitch, but he kept his head down on the second one.''

Said Glaus: ``They'd been making good pitches on me. Finally, I got one I could hit hard.''

Both clubs are now 4-5 in interleague play, and Tuesday night they both return to their own divisions, the Dodgers against NL West-leading Arizona at Dodger Stadium, the Angels - who Sunday actually gained a full game on runaway Seattle for the first time in more than a month, since going from nine back to eight on May 6 - at Texas.

``This was a big win,'' acknowledged Erstad, who drove in three of the Angels' runs. ``We're back in our own division, and we wanted to get some kind of momentum going. It was great to come back like that. That's the first hit I've had (in four at-bats) against Shaw. I was glad to get a pitch before he sliced me up as he has in the past.''

On getting to Shaw twice in a little more than a week, Scioscia said, ``Usually, nobody gets to him twice before the All-Star break.''

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Photo:

The Angels' Troy Glaus admires his game-winning, two-run homer in the ninth inning Sunday.

Kevork Djansezian/Associated Press