A beautiful day for a ballgame in Anaheim. Would the Angels keep it beautiful and get a series win against the Rangers? It was a pitching matchup between two native Venezuelans, Martin Perez of Texas and Jose Suarez of the Halos.
Suarez got through the top of the 1st but not completely unscathed, partially due to a bad throw by Urshela, but also a walked batter. However, it didn’t come back to bite him this time, giving the Angels a 0-0 score to come up to the plate the first time.
In the bottom of the 1st, Taylor Ward walked, then gave up his spot on first base to Mike Trout on a fielder’s choice. Shohei followed with another ground ball, but the throw to second was late, giving Rendon two runners on base. He proceeded to make them pay with his first Kabuto hit of the season. Finally!
A couple of outs later and the inning was over, but Suarez was able to go out in the 2nd inning with a nice 3-lead cushion. Great!
Umm, or it seemed great until the pitches started being thrown. An instant Heim walk and homerun from Ezequiel Duran made it 3-2. Taveras singled, Semien doubled, and a sac fly by Robbie Grossman made it a tie game at 3. Well, that lead was sure nice while it lasted!
The Angels went down 1-2-3 in the bottom of the 2nd. In the top of 3rd, the Rangers were all over Suarez. A walk, passed ball, and 2 straight singles gave the Rangers a 5-3 lead. Then a 2-run homer by Josh H. Smith (!!!) made the score 7-3 Texas. Smith had just come into the game after Travis Jankowski came out of the game with an apparent injury.
Suarez then came out of the game with his own apparent injury. It was probably time to take him out anyway, as nothing was working for him today like every other day this year outside of last week’s gem in Milwaukee. Enter Chase Silseth, who ended the inning with a groundout. Great chance for a rotation audition, maybe?
After Martin Perez sat for so long in the top of the inning, the Angels greeted him in the bottom of the 3rd with Ward and Ohtani walks and a Trout single in between. Rendon came up clutch with a bloop hit into center to get 1 run back.
Then Renfroe did his job with a long sac fly to get another run home. However, Drury was the killjoy ending the inning with a double play. But, the Halos inched a bit closer. 7-5 Texas after 3 innings.
Unfortunately, Silseth wasn’t the cure to the ill. A 1 out walk was followed by a Garcia double. Jung then grounded a ball to Rendon who made a throw home that was a bit too late, but a freak kick of the Thaiss’ glove by the runner sent the ball to the Texas on-deck circle, scoring a second run.
Then Leody Taveras hit a long double to center that a younger Trout would’ve likely grabbed, but time does catch up with us all /end existential thoughts/. Yet another two run scored.
The inning then ended with a lineout. 11-5 Rangers after 5.
Luckily the Angels came back out swinging. Urshela led off with a solid single up the middle. After a flyout, Thaiss looped another single back into center. Taylor Ward then sent a hit the opposite way to bring in a run.
After Trout struck out looking on a high fastball, Shohei came through with a soft grounder up the middle to bring the Angels another run closer. Chipping away! That ended Perez’ streak of pitching at least 5 innings at 37 games.
Enter Josh Sborz. Rendon walked, giving Renfroe a chance to tie the game with a grand slam. But that would only be a dream scenario, not reality. 11-7 Texas after 4 innings.
Silseth came out and had a nice 1-2-3 inning in the top of the 5th. A one-out hit by Urshela was erased by a double play. The first uneventful inning of the day left the score unchanged.
In the top of the 6th, Garcia led off with a single, stole second, and moved to third base on a fly ball. Silseth did a great job though, getting 2 outs, and no runs scored.
Thaiss led off the bottom of the inning with a ground ball single, but a couple of pop-outs followed before Texas replaced Sborz with Cole Ragans. A walk by Rendon brought up Renfroe with the bases and two outs again. Once again, no runs would score. A pop-out ended the inning.
A single and walk ended Silseth’s day after 3 1/3 innings with 4 runs allowed but only one earned. That brought in Cerritos’ own Chris Devenski to try to keep Silseth from being charged with more runs. Marcus Semien and Robbie Grossman were having none of that. Two singles tacked on another two runs to close the book on Silseth. Then, for good measure, Adolis Garcia hit a 3-run homer to make the score 16-7 Rangers before the inning mercifully ended. The Angels then went down in order in the bottom half.
Nothing of note happened in the 7th and 8th, then Renfroe hit a meaningless 9th inning home run with nobody on base that we could’ve used in his earlier at-bats. We got 8 runs and 13 hits, very good! But allowed 16 runs and 17 hits, very bad! Astros come to town next and we are two games out of first. This isn’t the last you’ve seen of the Angels, you Rangers!!!!
Well it arguably should have been a sweep by Texas so count blessings? Giving up 26 runs in 2 games and over 30 in 3 is….well it’s not good. So winning one game of three under those circumstances has to be considered a bonus.
Honestly the only injured pitcher I’m bummed about right now is Quijada. Warren maybe. But Loup and Suarez being out might be a good thing. It’ll be easy for Silseth to be slotted in Suarez’s spot since he took over today and pitched 72 pitches.
Please let the suarez nightmare be over with. Gassed by 5 innings, can’t make it through the lineup for the 3rd time, nothing but average pitches, and just a blob on the mound.
Can I get an amen?!
Well, ‘tecnical’ first place was nice. Made my Friday night.
Well then lets give everyone a trophy.
We still have 23 games left versus the state of Texas and if we dont pitch better it will be our Alamo in terms of making the playoffs.
Maybe you need a trophy.
Yes another World Series Trophy here would be nice.
Sorry (not sorry) I enjoyed my Friday night. Yeah I hope it is not our highlight for the year. It’s also a comment on our team’s performance yesterday and today.
We were in 1st place for exactly 1 day, lol.
’twas cool, for a day…
Starting tomorrow, let’s push the Asstros down a little further in the standings.
Good news, Rendon hit his first bomb.
Bad news : Angels got killed.
Thanks Capt. Obvious.
I was looking for today’s big turd’s silver lining.
Look who’s talking.
I think we were all aware that Tendon hit a HR. Nice try though..
Well at least it was meaningful. Both Drury and Renfroe hit their meaningless big deficit bottom of the ninth solo shots on Saturday and Sunday while leaving 13 runners on base between them this weekend. .And Renfroe didnt even play on Saturday.
Since This team is built to out slug teams, if those 2 dont get off their ass soon this season will be just as lost as the last 8.
Yes, I will give him that. Rendon has certainly been doing better in RISP situations lately.. And Friday night even though he didn’t drive in the winning run he was at the plate when it scored.
I think lately Renfroe deserves much more of our wrath than Rendon does…
and Drury who got the 2 year deal from Perry but is now batting .188 ( 6 for 32) with one walk and 2 solo home runs since the last Homestand. If you take out that 4 game series here against the lowly A’s his season is looking pretty bleak.
Well, hopefully Suarez takes his time “Rehabbing his injury” before he attempts to pitch another ML game. Sheesh that was brutal.
https://twitter.com/SamBlum3/status/1655356922642710529?s=20
Timing is everything!
I felt visual discomfort watching him throw BP to Texas.
It’s pathetic to be this pathetic.
https://twitter.com/SamBlum3/status/1655357740192247808?s=20
How about improved.
Should the Angels consider canning Matt Wise at some point?
Pitching continues to be a problem, especially for guys that have shown some level of competency in the past. Loup basically threw the staff under the bus. You have to wonder if their “don’t throw fastballs” philosophy is part of the reason all our pitchers have 20+ pitch innings and can’t go deep into games.
Not to mention the pitching staff failing to recognize pitch tipping on multiple occasions.
Let’s not forget that Reid Detmers was completely transformed last year by none other than our minor league staff. Wise and his crew couldn’t figure it out and his slider was fixed within 2 weeks in AAA.
Just seems like there is a lot to not like. Probably not enough to fire the guy, but I don’t think he is talented or adds much value.
No, the next guy to be canned is Minasian
How about Arturo.
Can only hope he gets his big stadium, land development project approved…
quickly. Until then, it’s “unfinished business.”
Well, that was a well rounded pitching disaster!
Angel pitching problems are like having your car towed to a mechanic and at the end of the day they tell you “it’s all fixed”. You drive home only to have the same problems appear the very next day. Shitty mechanic and a shitty car are the problem.
I think the pitching problems are internal. Last year, with Ortega tipping, Detmers had to see a minor league coach to get help, a new pitch sequence with Loup (see Athletic article), and Suarez this year. I also see mechanical issues with Anderson. The totality of these examples tells me the Angels are challenged with addressing and fixing pitching problems internally and need to wake up and start finding answers to help their staff sooner vs later.
Amazing how many runs the Angels pitching staff gave up to Rangers. I thought we were better than that.
It is not just us though. They are a very good team.
They’ve been scoring ALOT of runs against alot of people …
You’re gonna need a bigger boat… — “Rangers” (2023)
Angels are chum’ps
https://youtu.be/ujUfZ3tH1gQ
Yeah, the Rangers have been playing well on both sides of the game. Pitching wise, the Ranges have surprised but just need to wait and see how good they will be. Ranges have been effective with the bat but the Angels are right there. But the Angels big flaw is speed. 3rd worst in MLB.
By speed do you mean stolen bases, taking the extra base, or both?
or methamphetamine. That would explain a lot too.
The Stolen Base category is easy to measure and report. Hard to measure taking the extra base. But, with fast runners, one would assume that helps taking the extra base. Drury, Rendon, Ward, Wallach, Rengid (looks speedy but cannot steal a pack of gum) and Renslow won’t threaten too much. Trout has given up stealing.
The one great thing the Angels have done this year is cut down on team Strikeouts. Helps when Squid, Marsh and Walsh have not been up to at bay wearing Angel Red.
Wait, seriously? Sure, the Angels didn’t do well, and giving up double digit runs is bad. But you can’t say the Rangers pitching was doing well this series – can you? They gave up 8 runs last night (on their starter, mostly), and their pen was abysmal most of the time. Sure, they had a good start against Eovaldi but otherwise they were immensely hittable all series.
We lost the series, but we are still over .500 and we can go toe to toe with these guys if we get the back of our rotation in order.
Check MLB Team pitching standings, sort on ERA, WHIP, Average and BB allowed. All top 10 in in MLB and better than the Halos in all those categories. Even with the clunker this weekend. I’m not freaking out like most here. Still liking the Halos to win the division.
My point is that our offense was getting to the Rangers. They aren’t light years ahead of us right now. They have just one more win overall (just fewer losses).
Our pitching has also been good, statistically. We can improve there, and we didn’t have either Sandoval or Ohtani up, whereas Eovaldi and Perez are their top two pitchers. Maybe this series goes differently if we are facing Heaney and Dunning instead?
Nobody said they are “light years” ahead of us. There are however more productive as an offensive club AND more consistent… Also, you could make the argument that their SP is better… Actually you could make it easily.
I guess light years is my sense of the gloom and doom response to our two series in Texas – with some around here thinking it will really expose how we need to tear it all down, Trade Trout, and start over.
I think we can improve, but also that we are a tweak or two away from playoff contention (if we aren’t there already).
I have made the argument that due to the wealth of really good teams in the AL East that the only path to the playoffs for the Angels is winning the AL West. THAT means we have to beat the Rangers…
We took them lightly by not scheduling Ohtani to pitch in this series and chose to instead have him pitch against the A’s on April 27th at home so Arte could make a few more bucks…
And Voila, just like I predicted it came back to bite us. This was a huge series and not starting Ohtani was probably the difference between winning it and losing it..
Finally, right now who looks like the better team? I don’t think there is anyway you can honestly say it is not Texas.
That does not mean we can’t catch them, but we have alot of improvement to make and adjustments to make in order to be able to do that… In a couple of weeks we play them again for 4 more in Texas.. We’ll see at that time if we have done what was needed..
Fair enough, but I also think that the AL East will come back to earth a bit (standings wise) as they have to beat each other up.
You say “beat eachother up,” but when they play head to head somebody has to win. It is therefore hard to jump over several teams in the WC standings..
I had a feeling the Rangers would take the series 2-1 before game 1. My evaluation would be base on did the Angels make it close and or be competitive. The day game at home with Suarez pitching vs a top offense in the division who know him did worry me (knowing the ball travels). Friday was a great showing that the offense could wake up and take a game away. Saturday, we saw another struggling pitcher. Sunday same thing occurred, except the offense showed great signs, and winnable game had they fixed their pitching woes. Now is the time to make tougher decisions going forward not to let these types of games occur where you give away a game in the division. The White Sox are going to be sellers, so I think the time is to look at their guys and clean this up sooner versus later. We know the offense is good and some pitchers need to clean up their mechanics and approach, but the back end of the rotation and BP needs immediate help.
Which pale sox are you thinking? The return of Key? Joe Kelly? Colome and Lopez both blew saves recently, so are they better than our options?
Middleton reunion. Greg Santos isn’t bad. Giolito or Cease would be good lol
Sure, and I am going to win the Powerball without buying a ticket. Maybe we can pry Key from them, but no one is selling Cease (3 years of ARB left) or Santos (still a rookie) and I doubt Giolito is on the block. They have a solid core, even if they are having a down year.
Bochy has done a great job playing to the strengths of the team he has.
Nevin….not so much
Probably because Nevin was interim and they just stuck with him instead of hunting. Same with Matt Wise.
Was listening to the game on the way back from a weekend trip to Arlington for the Ed Sheeran show last night… was so pumped for that early 3 run lead… just to vanish before I could even think about the team blowing it. Man… I really had thoughts of taking 2 out of 3 there for a minute. Silly me.
Another nice road trip, followed by a “Full Bundy” home-stand..Momentum be damned.
35 games in, 2 out of 1st. Not bad. Let’s beat Houston.
They’ve always been shitty!
Well, it is good that you’re not a quitter because we have alot of work to do to be as consistent and as good as Texas.
The Rangers clubbed us like we were baby seals in this series.. Yes, the Friday night win was an incredible win, it was a great comeback and it inspired us. But the last two days brought us back to reality… My earlier comments about the pitching matchups turned out to be prescient… We have to do something about our 4-5 starters… Maybe give Detmers a rest… And Suarez should simply be outright DFA’d.
And what is up with the RISP situations, especially Renfro? He’s been shitting the bed from the 4 or 5 spot in the order. Can’t have that when Trout and Ohtani draw so many walks …
The pitching matchups for this series weren’t favorable. More importantly, the Angels need to get some positive performances from their starting pitchers not named Ohtani. Sandoval looks worse than expected. Detmers looks much worse than thought. Anderson isn’t pitching well. Suarez is a train wreck and hurt. Basically one of the keys to the season hasn’t been producing.
Wife and I just saw Taylor at the Pantages, she was awesome.
But back to baseball, they’re just embarrassing.
I saw her while she was touring her last special. Was such a fun night.
Super embarrassing, indeed.
we are streaking – just the WRONG kind of streak. Time for a steak.
Streak is 3 in a row either way, winning or losing.