No Sinking Allowed in the AL West : Baseball: Twins stop the Angels and Sanderson, 2-0, but Kelly’s disposition is anything but sunny.

MINNEAPOLIS — Minnesota Twin Manager Tom Kelly smiled in front of all the reporters and television cameras Sunday, trying his best to act confident, even brazen about the Twins’ fate.

They had just defeated the Angels, 2-0, allowing the 29,669 fans at the Metrodome to go home feeling good about the Twins again, believing the worst is behind.

Considering the Twins (31-40) have endured the three longest losing streaks in the big leagues this season and still are alive in the American League West--7 1/2 games behind the Chicago White Sox--why shouldn’t everyone feel upbeat?

“We’ve got to feel that way,” said Jim Deshaies (9-5), who shut out the Angels on four hits in eight innings. “Any other year, we’d be out of it, but we’re right there. I think we still have a good chance.”

Kelly, waiting for his office to empty, pulled out a cigar and let the smoke billow overhead, pondering the same thought. He knows what the public wants to hear. He understands the repercussions of sounding anything other than optimistic.

Yet, even on a day the Twins won, spoiling Angel starter Scott Sanderson’s six-hitter, Kelly couldn’t resist allowing his feelings to escape.

“I’m as optimistic as the next guy,” said Kelly, who has managed two World Series championship teams, “but I’m not a dummy either. The only difference this year is that it will take longer for us to drop out because the division is so bad.

“I can’t tell this to our local (media), because we still want them to come around all summer, but you’ve got to be realistic. It doesn’t matter if we’re in Little League or Instructional League, we’re not going to win a damn thing unless there are drastic improvements, and it’s tough to see that happening. It would be different if this were April, but we’re talking about two weeks until the All-Star break, and we’ve got the same problems.”

While the only difference in the Angels’ predicament is that they are 2 1/2 games out of first with a 37-36 record, their fate could be the same. The only earned run Sanderson gave up came on Brian Harper’s two-out, run-scoring single in the first inning, but it proved to be enough.

“People think it’s fun that our division is the way it is, keeping everyone so close,” Kelly said. “There’s nothing funny about it at all. It’s sad. It’s pathetic.”

Although Kelly’s agitation has been building for weeks, the hitting by both teams provoked his disgust. It wasn’t as if this were a pitching duel between Roger Clemens and Jack McDowell, Kelly said. It was Scott Sanderson and Jim Deshaies.

“How tough could it be to make some adjustments?” Kelly said. “Some of our guys were back from the plate so far that you didn’t even know they were up there. He made (Shane) Mack, (Kent) Hrbek and (Kirby) Puckett look sick.

“How many slow curves was it going to take for (Puckett) to adjust--one hundred, two hundred?”

Said Deshaies, who has won as many games this season as in the last two combined: “Guys like Sanderson and myself don’t scare a whole lot of hitters. You don’t need a radar gun for guys like us. When guys like us win, you tend to leave a whole lot of people frustrated.”

The Angels, shut out for the fourth time in a month, had a runner reach second base only once against Deshaies in eight innings. Bullpen stopper Rick Aguilera then needed only nine pitches to shut them down in the ninth for his 21st save. Aguilera has retired 27 consecutive batters.

“There will be a lot of nightmares in Oakland tonight,” Angel Manager Buck Rodgers said of their next destination, “because there were a lot of soft collars today. Jim Deshaies is not impressive, except for the results.

“I’ve seen Deshaies good, and I’ve seen Deshaies terrible and there’s no difference. I’ve seen him throw the the same stuff (as Sunday) and last two innings.”

“Look, there are reasons why guys like Deshaies and Sanderson have been released.”

And there are numerous reasons, Rodgers said, why it’s crazy to consider the Twins and Angels legitimate contenders.

“The Twins are in the same position we are,” Rodgers said. “A typical year, we’d both be buried. Matchups is pitching. And right now, our pitching doesn’t match up with too many clubs.”

The Twins, who have the worst earned-run average in the major leagues outside the state of Colorado, cringe at the prospect of where they would be without Deshaies.

“We’d be in the outhouse,” Kelly said. “Well, we’re already in the outhouse, so I guess you’d say we’d be flushed.”