The last afternoon of baseball before the All-Star break and the Angels are making it feel like a long summer already. Jose Soriano got the start opposite Taj Bradley.
The Pitching Picture
Jose Soriano gave the Angels five innings and not much more. The 3rd inning did the damage – four straight Twins reached base, Ryan Jeffers doubled to left scoring two, and Minnesota took the lead without looking back. Five innings, five hits, three earned runs by the time Soriano’s afternoon was done. Silseth came in to pitch a clean 6th and needed Ryan Zeferjahn to close out the 7th. Zeferjahn then gave up a solo home run to Trevor Larnach in the 8th, extending the Twins lead.
Bradley earned every bit of his paycheck this afternoon. Seven innings, six hits, two runs, six strikeouts, 99 pitches. He surrendered two solo home runs and nothing else of consequence. When Trout and Schanuel put runners on in the 6th with nobody out, Adell grounded into a double play on the first pitch he saw to end the threat. Bradley didn’t flinch. Andrew Morris got the heart of the order out 1-2-3 in the 8th before closing the game out in the 9th for good.
Angels Offense
Two swings carried this offense. Josh Lowe had one of those swings in the 2nd – a 405 foot solo home run to right center – and Denzer Guzman added his own solo home run in the 7th to cut the Twins lead to 3-2. But that was it. Zach Neto went 0-for-4 in the leadoff spot, Mike Trout and Nolan Schanuel had multi-hit games but were left stranded by Jorge Soler and Jo Adell in the 3rd and 6th innings. Logan O’Hoppe couldn’t do anything with runners on in the 9th inning and flied out to end the game.
The Bottom Line
The 3rd inning is where this game was decided. The Angels got back to back singles from Trout and Schanuel but were left on base when Soler hit into a fielder’s choice. The Twins took that momentum into the bottom half of the inning, strung together some singles before getting a timely, bases clearing, double from Jeffers. Angels lose 4-2 and go into the All Star Break with the worst record in baseball at 38-59.
