Santana is a homemade man again

Maybe the Angels can fit Ervin Santana with a pair of 3-D goggles that, when worn on the road, create the optical illusion the right-hander is standing on the mound in Angel Stadium. Or, they could go to a 5 1/2 -man rotation, with Santana starting at home and Dustin Moseley filling his spot on the road.

Santana has had a baffling tendency to be awesome at home and awful on the road, but that worked in his favor Sunday in Angel Stadium, where he gave up one run in seven dominant innings to lead the Angels to a 6-1 victory over Seattle, completing a three-game sweep of the Mariners.

Relying on well-placed fastballs and sliders and an occasional changeup, Santana gave up six hits, struck out five and walked one, his only blemish Adrian Beltre’s solo home run in the fifth inning.

The 24-year-old Santana, in his third season, is 21-5 with a 3.01 earned-run average in 33 home starts and 9-13 with a 6.78 ERA in 27 starts on the road.

“I think you guys think too much about that,” Santana told reporters after the game. “I don’t worry about it. I just try to do my job, do my best and see how it goes.”

It did not go well in his previous two starts. Santana gave up six runs in 4 1/3 innings of a 7-6 loss to Cleveland in Milwaukee on April 10 and seven runs -- five earned -- in four innings of a 7-2 loss in Boston last Monday. Sunday, Santana was a long way from the road, and it showed.

“I think it’s more about stuff and approach and getting comfortable in a game than whether he’s wearing a white or gray uniform,” Manager Mike Scioscia said. “Ervin needs to take this basic package on the road and get more consistent with it before he tries to expand his repertoire.”

Scioscia thought Santana tinkered too much with his pitches in his last two starts, so he advised him to simplify his approach, concentrate on locating his fastball and getting ahead of hitters.

Santana did just that and seemed to kick it up a notch when he got into trouble, stranding Raul Ibanez after he led off the second inning with a triple, escaping a two-on, one-out jam in the fourth and striking out Ichiro Suzuki and Willie Bloomquist after Jamie Burke’s one-out double in the fifth.

“Ervin was aggressive with everything,” Scioscia said. “His last couple of starts, he was improvising more than he needs to. He got back to basics.... The game he pitched today is the type of game he needs to pitch on the road.”

The Angels would do well to take this offense on the road too. After batting .214 and scoring 16 runs during their 1-7 trip against Cleveland, Boston and Oakland, the Angels returned home and batted .356 -- and .400 with runners in scoring position -- with 21 runs in three games against Seattle.

Gary Matthews Jr. had two doubles and a run batted in Sunday, Vladimir Guerrero had two hits and an RBI and leads the American League with a .400 average, Casey Kotchman had two hits, including the first triple of his career, and an RBI, and Garret Anderson knocked in two runs to pace the Angels’ 11-hit attack.

The Angels scored twice in the second, once in the third, twice in the fifth and once in the seventh, giving Santana plenty of breathing room.

“We’ve done 180-degree turnarounds twice this season,” Scioscia said. “We had the first week here, the road trip, then back here. Hopefully it will stabilize and we’ll get the pressure we need to put on teams.

“Guys are getting more comfortable, getting on base earlier in innings and driving guys in. We’re seeing the signs we need. I just hope we don’t have another drought like we had on the road.”

mike.digiovanna@latimes.com