Angels’ Brandon Wood tries to stay upbeat

Angels management kept reinforcing Brandon Wood’s confidence, rickety because of an awful slump, with positive messages.

But that didn’t seem to work. Everyone was telling Wood, 25, once a coveted third base prospect, all kinds of things.

Messages clogged his mind. He couldn’t concentrate. He over-thought. And his slump worsened.

So, thick in a pennant race, management could sit idly by no longer and, on July 23, made a move that reminded all that baseball is, at its core, a business:

The club traded for Alberto Callaspo of the Kansas City Royals to play third base. And Callaspo, who is batting .277, will be under the Angels’ control through 2013.

Wood, who is batting .168, said he understands the move.

“I didn’t do what I had to do to help the team,” he said.

But because he is out of options, Wood can’t be demoted to triple A to work on his game.

And the Angels are unlikely to trade him, which General Manager Tony Reagins confirmed the day of the Callaspo trade, noting, “We’re not going to make any decisions and give up on Brandon Wood.”

So Wood must sit there, third on the depth chart behind Callaspo and Maicer Izturis and watch from the bench, where he has been since Callaspo arrived.

“It’s not a good position,” Manager Mike Scioscia said. “Nobody feels good about it. And until we get to the point where Brandon can get the look he needs, we’re going to have keep grinding this thing out.”

Wood won the Angels’ starting job at third base during spring training, the highlight of his season.

Since, he has searched for his lost swing, the one that made him seem so promising, but has yet to find it.

He searches before the game in the batting cage, pitch after pitch, trying to hit a few in a row just right. He searches again during the game, sometimes with one or two more cage visits.

When he goes home, he tries to leave baseball at the ballpark.

“It was tough for that first month and a half to come home and not think about baseball,” he said.

Now, he’ll watch a movie with his fiancee, his mind clear of the game, which is the opposite of what Torii Hunter said has hurt Wood the most: He can’t leave baseball alone.

“He wants to do well so he’ll listen to everybody,” said the All-Star center fielder, “and you really can’t do that.”

It’s as simple as the old line that too many chefs can spoil the broth. Wood realizes this now.

“Every day, I would come in and go, ‘I gotta do this, I gotta do that,’ and then I’m in the batter’s box, facing somebody, and I’ve got five different steps I’m trying to go through to hit a 95-mile-an-hour fastball or adjust if it’s a nasty slider,” Wood said.

He has said he wants to be an Angel, and he believes now, his mind clearer, that he can simplify the messages and find his swing again.

“And once I figure it out, I’ve got a long time to play in the big leagues,” he said.

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