Angels manager Mike Scioscia hadn't seen a four-game losing streak all season. When he saw one Saturday, he decided it was time to close the clubhouse doors and talk to his team.

"You have to get back to that in-house, pitch-to-pitch mentality," Scioscia said Sunday when asked what his message to the team was. "Sometimes guys might have been trying to chew off too much at a time. Not one guy is going to carry us to our goal. But some guys might be thinking they're going to be that one guy.

"That was the gist of what we talked about."

The Angels snapped their first four-game losing streak of the season Sunday with a victory over the A's. But they are just 13-12 in the month of September, slumping offensively and playing sloppily on defense at times.

But Scioscia would not acknowledge fatigue as a possible explanation for his team's sagging down the stretch. At one point, the Angels played 40 games in 41 days (part of a 50-in-52 finish to the regular season.

"Some guys have gotten physically worn down by the long season. But it's no different than it is for Oakland or Boston or the Yankees or the Mariners," Scioscia said. "I don't see mental fatigue. I don't see physical fatigue. I just see it as a focus issue that we're dealing with."

ANGELS 7, A'S 4: The Angels moved to within one win of clinching their fifth division title in the past six seasons with the victory (and a Rangers loss) Sunday. LHP Joe Saunders threw six shutout innings before running into trouble in the seventh inning. By then, the Angels had built a 5-0 lead with home runs by Kendry Morales and Mike Napoli. The A's closed to within a run in the eighth, but the Angels added two insurance runs on Maicer Izturis' double in the bottom of the eighth.

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