The Baltimore Orioles rolled out the ancient and antique Freddy Garcia to face the Halos this afternoon. Freddy Garcia is thirty six years old. Tim Salmon batted against Freddy Garcia. He hit .348 against him in his career. Gary Disarcina batted against Freddy Garcia in his career, going 1 for 2 for a .500 batting average! Today, with a retired Tim Salmon in the booth and watching on, the entire franchise of the LA Angels of Anaheim went up against that same Freddy Garcia, and managed six hits in 33 at-bats. That's .182. For a team that is now batting .257. Thirty six year old Freddy Garcia actually no-hit this crew for 6 frickin' innings.
Tommy Hanson put up a strong start. Mark Trumbo knocked in another bomb. Mike Trout nabbed a nice RBI. And Ernesto Frieri came in for relief and struck out all three batters he faced. All goodness.
But then Mike Scioscia was managing. And tactically he painted himself into a corner. And, practically, he handed the game over to the opposition. An inopportune sac bunt. An astounding lift of Frieri after only three batters. A mysterious faith in the speed of Mark Trumbo on the base path. I can't fault him for getting trapped into substituting away his DH, since the third catcher on his depth chart was sitting in the Orioles dugout. But I can fault him for bringing in Brendan Harris for Frieri so that he could bring in Garrett Richards for Howie Kendrick. This was done just in time to let the Orioles ding away at Richards and Harris miss out on that critical jam-escaping double play for which we pay Kendrick.
Freddy Garcia started playing MLB ball in 1999. Thanks to the Angels, Freddy is not retiring any time soon. Mike Scioscia started managing MLB ball in 2000. Thanks to the Angels, neither is Mike. The 2013 LA Angels of Anaheim allow a 36 year old Freddy Garcia crawl up from AAA, take the mound, and no-hit them for 6 solid innings, as the Angels manage to lose, 5-4..