ANAHEIM — Mike Scioscia has his managerial mantras. They work for him, and he's not going to veer from them now.

Mantra No. 1 — basically the old cliché, "we're taking it one game at a time" — somehow still has a whiff of meaning when Scioscia says it, even after eight years of constant repetition, simply because the Angels manager is so earnest and insistent about it, and because he's convinced his players to believe it, too.

So, after the Angels beat the Toronto Blue Jays on Sunday, if you were expecting a lot of bluster and buildup for a Showdown In Seattle, well, you were clearly in the wrong place. And you haven't been paying attention to the Scioscia Way.

For those unfamiliar with that approach, the first reminder came Sunday morning. When the first three questions in Scioscia's pregame chat with reporters all dealt with the series that begins tonight in Seattle, not the wrapup of the set with the Blue Jays, Scioscia protested.

"Let's talk about today's game," he said. "We're getting ahead a little bit."

The Angels avoided that trap, thanks to a strong pitching performance by Kelvim Escobar in a 3-1 victory. But the crowd of 40,565 at Angel Stadium was unusually quiet throughout. Perhaps they, too, were distracted by the forthcoming series with the Mariners, who have stubbornly remained on the Angels' heels all summer.

Once the Blue Jays were dispatched, the games with the Mariners became fair conversational game, and brought another of Scioscia's managerial mantras into play. As this one — an adjunct of that one-game-at-a-time saw — has it, no game is more important than any other.

And so, while the standings suggest this between first- and second-place teams is hugely important, Scioscia steadfastly maintained otherwise.

"There's a lot of baseball left," he said. "And obviously for us to get through our division, you're going to have to beat Seattle, but it's not going to change the way we approach or go about our business. If you play well and come away with wins, your task isn't done. And if you play poorly, you're not defeated.

"Sure, there's going to be huge interest in it, but what we need to do is focus on how we'll play the game, and playing the game."

That's not quite the same as saying "just another game," but it's close.

And while you and I may not buy into that idea, the Angels historically have bought into the Scioscia mantras. Since it's worked, they aren't going to break with that now.

"You can't put too much emphasis on this at all," said Garret Anderson, who hit his 250th career homer Sunday. "There's a lot of games left. What you do for a living, I can see why you'd be scoreboard watching. But the players, we don't do that. We have to play the game that night, and worry about what's going on, on the field, that day."

The veterans have heard the Scioscia mantras for so long they've practically adopted them as their own. (Anderson's declaration that "there are too many games left" for this series to be significant was essentially a smudged carbon of Scioscia's "there's a lot of baseball left.")

Some of the younger players apparently haven't gotten the memo yet. Jered Weaver, after discussing the strange feeling of having older brother Jeff on the other side of the Angels-Mariners race — "It's been kind of weird," he said — was one player willing to admit this series is a big one.

"It doesn't have anything to do with me or Jeff," he said. "It's a battle to win the division. And I think that's what's most important, taking a fresh mindset and go in there knowing we need to take at least two of these three games to get a little bit more of a lead on them."

It was an honest answer, but given that it's not in keeping with the Scioscia mantras, it would be no surprise if Weaver receives a little coaching on the topic during this series, and comes out of it sounding like, say, Anderson.

It may be a big series, but to say so goes against Scioscia's managerial mantras.

"There's over 30 games left," Scioscia said. "We've got to play good baseball to reach our goal, and that's what we're going to focus on, not who we're playing or anything that's going to creep in and become a distraction."

Scioscia's insistence on such single-mindedness — and his team's willingness and ability to follow along — has been one of the constants in his term as manager. From the outside, it sometimes seems a little silly — and this certainly seems like one of those times. Who, really, believes this is just another series?

Apparently, the Angels do. At the very least, they say they do. Either way, it works for them.

And in a small way, that says everything about Scioscia's success in leading the Angels. Somehow, he can turn a cliché into a philosophical cornerstone — and get 25 major league players to follow along.

It's exactly the sort of thing that helps the Angels succeed in big series, even if they won't call them that.

— Contact Star columnist David Lassen at dlassen@VenturaCountyStar.com.