Padres Catch Up to Angels

The Angels, all set to face a wily veteran, got a wild rookie instead Friday night when the San Diego Padres traded left-hander Fernando Valenzuela to St. Louis hours before his scheduled start at Anaheim Stadium.

The Angels also got an 8-7 loss, when Quilvio Veras doubled off Shigetoshi Hasegawa to score Greg Vaughn with two out in the 14th inning.

With Valenzuela gone, enter 23-year-old right-hander Will Cunnane, making his fourth major league start.

Three and two-thirds innings later, exit Cunnane, who faced 23 batters, threw 94 pitches, gave up seven runs, eight hits and walked five.

But just when the Angels were beginning to wonder why somebody hadn’t thought of this wonderful interleague-play idea before, their offense went stale and the Padres freshened their attack. San Diego got a two-run homer from former Angel Wally Joyner in the sixth, scored three times after the first two batters in the eighth inning made outs and turned what appeared to be an easy Angel victory in front of 24,664 into an extra-inning battle of almosts.

It looked as if the Padres might pull ahead in the ninth when Steve Finley led off with a single to right, but catcher Chad Kreuter threw him out trying to steal before Joyner got his second hit of the night, a single to center. Angel reliever Pep Harris struck out Greg Vaughn to end the threat.

Then the Angels almost pulled out a victory in the bottom of the inning. With one out and reliever Trevor Hoffman on the mound for San Diego, Dave Hollins doubled down the left-field line for his fourth hit of the night. Hoffman walked Jim Edmonds intentionally, stuck out Tim Salmon and Garret Anderson, who waved feebly at a 3-2 pitch.

Chris Gomez singled with one out in the 10th, but Kreuter also threw him out trying to steal, so Angel closer Troy Percival had to face only three batters in the inning.

Kreuter, who arrived in the May 18 trade with the White Sox that brought Tony Phillips back to Anaheim, was doing his best to help his new teammates to a two-game sweep of the Padres . . . and a chance to get to bed before 1 a.m. He doubled to right to open the 10th and gave way to pinch-runner Orlando Palmeiro. Palmeiro moved to third on Hoffman’s wild pitch, but Luis Alicea popped up and Palmeiro was out at the plate trying to score on Phillips’ chopper to first.

The Padres had runners at first and third with two out in the 12th, when Quilvio Veras took off from first. Jim Leyritz, who had taken over behind the plate, fired the ball to shortstop Gary DiSarcina, who delivered a strike back to Leyritz as Joyner tried to score. Joyner was out by five feet.

Knuckleballer Dennis Springer, who appeared to have plenty of support to pick up his fourth victory in his last six starts, went six innings before giving way to Mike Holtz. Holtz retired four of the five batters he faced before Manager Terry Collins brought in Mike James with one out in the eighth.

James, who had picked up his third victory of the season against San Diego on Thursday night, got Vaughn to pop up and then got in big trouble. Veras singled to left, Gomez tripled under the glove of a diving Edmonds in center and John Flaherty singled in Gomez. Pinch-runner Chris Jones stole second and scored on Henderson’s single to left to tie the score.

The Padres jumped on Springer for a run in the first, thanks to Tony Gwynn’s double into the left-field gap and Ken Caminiti’s run-scoring single to center. But the Angels came right back after Cunnane, who had opened the season with 15 relief appearances before moving into the starting rotation May 30, scoring on Edmonds’ RBI single and Kreuter’s two-run single.