By Larry Fine
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Angels have to play like they have nothing to lose when they fight against elimination from the playoffs versus the New York Yankees on Saturday, Los Angeles manager Mike Scioscia said.
Los Angeles trails New York 3-2 in the best-of-seven American League Championship Series. The winner faces the National League champion Philadelphia Phillies in the World Series.
"You have to play like you're playing with house money, because if you're afraid to fail or you're afraid to lose, you will never achieve," Scioscia told reporters on a conference call Friday on the eve of their showdown in the Bronx.
"So I think you go out there and you have to play free. You have to play with nothing in your mind except making plays and winning a game and not be afraid to go out there and play the game of baseball.
"I think we're at our best when we're in that mode."
The Angels escaped elimination at home on Thursday by rallying from a 6-4, seventh-inning deficit for a 7-6 victory that cut New York's lead to one game in the ALCS.
GREAT COMEBACKS
Scioscia has already been part of great playoff comebacks as a player and manager.
He was a catcher on the 1981 Los Angeles Dodgers team that dropped the first two games of the World Series to the Yankees but came back to win the next four for the Fall Classic crown.
As manager of the 2002 Angels, his club overcame a 5-0 deficit in Game Six of the World Series to beat the San Francisco Giants 6-5 and force a climactic seventh game, won by the American Leaguers.
Los Angeles clinched their place in this season's ALCS by scoring three runs in the ninth-inning off Boston Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon at Fenway Park.
"I don't think there's a team in baseball that really quits, but you have to have the talent..." said Scioscia.
"I think the one thing that made us all feel good was under the circumstances we did it on the road against one of the top closers in baseball," he added about the Fenway fightback.
"I think the confidence to play well and play well on the road in the playoffs is very, very important because it's obvious we don't have home-field advantage, and you're going to have to go in there and you're going to have to win.
"We're confident that we're going to move forward and play well and get this done."
(Editing by Ken Ferris; To query or comment on this story email sportsfeedback@thomsonreuters.com)
