THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
ANAHEIM, Calif. - John Lackey and the Los Angeles Angels ended Scott Kazmir's six-game winning streak. The Tampa Bay left-hander was convinced that plate umpire Derryl Cousins contributed.
Gary Matthews Jr. and Vladimir Guerrero homered for the Angels in Wednesday's 4-2 victory. But what bothered Kazmir and Rays manager Joe Maddon the most was Cousins' strike zone.
Reggie Willits drew a two-out walk just before Maicer Izturis drove in the tying and go-ahead runs with a single in the seventh that ended Kazmir's outing, and Maddon was ejected by Cousins after changing pitchers.
"That was unbelievable. I've never seen anything like that before," the 24-year-old Kazmir said. "I mean, you come into the game and some of the veteran guys are talking about an umpire that doesn't like calling anybody out on strikes. They called him 'shoe box.' You shouldn't change your zone just because of the count."
There were 18 strikeouts in the game, and only two batters looked at strike three - Tampa Bay's Willy Aybar in the fourth inning and Matthews in the eighth.
"It's a big advantage for a hitter if he knows that the guy's not going to call somebody out on strikes," said Kazmir, who pitched six scoreless innings against the Angels in a 2-0 victory on May 10 to begin his winning streak.
"As soon as Willits got up, it was like, 'You can swing if you want to, but if not, just take your base. Thanks for coming. It's all good.' It's like it was predetermined - like he already had it in his head what he was going to call. I thought I had Willits on the AB before that, too, and it didn't get called."
Maddon, who spent 31 years with the Angels and six as manager Mike Scioscia's bench coach, has been ejected eight times in his three seasons as a manager - four times against the Halos.
"I didn't like the calls. I didn't like the calls at all. I was disappointed with that and I let my voice be heard," Maddon said. "My biggest concern always is that the same strike zone is maintained throughout the game. That's all I'm looking for - that things don't change when it gets hot."
The Rays were a franchise-record 13 games over .500 when they began this 3-6 road trip, which included a bench-clearing brawl at Boston and a confrontation on the mound between batterymates Matt Garza and Dioner Navarro that resumed in the dugout during a game at Texas. So it was fitting that it ended with a Maddon ejection in his old neighborhood.
