ANGELS HAVEN'T FIGURED IT OUT YET SEATTLE 4, ANGELS 1.

Byline: Joe Haakenson Staff Writer

SEATTLE - Mickey Hatcher's face is red and his eyes are bloodshot, but he wears a smile on his face.

The Angels hitting coach wants to keep things positive through the club's offensive slump, but so far his efforts have gone for naught. The latest example was Friday night's 4-1 loss to the Seattle Mariners before 38,518 at Safeco Field.

One night after Freddy Garcia shut them down, the Angels were baffled by the off-speed stuff of John Halama, who gave up one run and six hits in seven innings to get the win.

Again, the Angels wasted a strong outing by their starter. Pat Rapp threw an eight-inning complete game, the Angels' first of the season.

For Hatcher and the Angels hitters, it was back to the drawing board.

``It's not so much mechanics,'' Hatcher said. ``A lot of it is breaks. They're always in the hole (in the count). Pitchers are making good pitches and they're getting bad pitches called for strikes.

``Our job is to keep them positive. We're not getting hits, but guys are going up there and a lot of them are having great at-bats. Other teams are getting hits on broken bats and flares and we're not. But they're in there working.''

The Angels offense has been virtually nonexistent since they beat the Mariners on Garret Anderson's ninth-inning homer last Friday. In the seven games since, including Friday, the Angels have averaged 2.3 runs per game and batted .186. And they've lost six of seven.

They rank in the bottom half of the league in average, runs, hits, total bases, doubles, walks and on-base percentage.

But it appeared they might break out of it in the first inning Friday against Halama. Darin Erstad doubled to lead off the game, and, one out later, Tim Salmon walked. With two out, Anderson reached out and poked one that hit the third-base bag and rolled into left field for an RBI double. But with runners on second and third, Bengie Molina grounded out to end the threat.

That was about it.

Halama was done after seven innings, and his performance was nothing out of the ordinary. In seven career games against the Angels, Halama is 5-0 with a 2.82 ERA.

``Guys started out with a pretty good game plan, but as the game went on, they started to pull the ball and hit into a couple double plays,'' Angels manager Mike Scioscia said.

``The whole lineup is frustrated. But we have enough confidence in these guys to stay patient. I won't say it's fun to watch, but this is a group of guys that are going to swing the bat. Our job is to try to get 'em to relax and play ball.''

Rapp (0-3) picked up where he left off from his last start. In that one, he gave up one run and five hits in seven innings against the Mariners, only to watch the bullpen blow the lead and the game.

Ichiro Suzuki led off the first with a double - extending his major-league-leading hitting streak to 15 games - advanced to third on a groundout to shortstop and then scored on a groundout to second.