WASHINGTON – The young core of the Angels offense suddenly had a bad day.
Although Jo Adell hit a two-run homer in the second inning, he and the other young hitters who have carried the Angels of late came up empty on numerous occasions at the end of the 3-2, 10-inning loss to the Washington Nationals on Friday night.
José Soriano left the field after six innings with a one-run lead, but José Quijada allowed the tying run in the eighth inning and Matt Moore was credited with the game-winning run in the tenth. The Nationals put their automatic runner on third base with a bunt against Moore, and then Ben Joyce allowed the game-winning hit on a line drive that second baseman Luis Guillorme couldn’t parry.
However, it should not have come to this.
When manager Ron Washington was asked to rate the Angels’ at-bats with runners in scoring position—they were 1 of 13—he answered succinctly.
“They weren’t very good,” he said. “We had some chances and just had to put the ball in play, but tonight we didn’t put it in play. That was the game.”
Nolan Schanuel, Zach Neto and Logan O’Hoppe — who currently occupy the top three spots in the order — have gone hitless in 15 at-bats combined. Neto and Schanuel are both coming off big games in New York, but O’Hoppe is currently a 2-for-32 softball, which roughly puts him in the No. 3 spot.
“It looks to me like he’s not just trying to get base hits, he’s trying to do damage,” Washington said. “And that’s the one thing I was trying to stop him from doing by putting him in that third hole. Just getting his hits. The damage comes when they make a mistake. It’s a learning period for him. He’s figuring out that it’s not an easy situation. I think he can handle it. He just has to grow with it.”
O’Hoppe was in the batting cage for at least 30 minutes after the game, doing extra work with the Angels’ hitting coaches.
He came up empty with a runner in scoring position in the seventh and 10th innings. In the seventh inning, the first two batters of the inning had hits, putting them at the top of the batting order. Schanuel flew out trying to bunt, and then Neto threw a groundout and O’Hoppe struck out.
In the eighth inning, with runners on second and third base and one out, Adell was at bat and needed only a fly ball to give the Angels a two-run lead. It failed.
Adell had two runners on base on each of his next three attempts and remained hitless.
The Angels also had three attempts to bring their automatic runner home in the 10th inning and failed.
The Angels could probably just write it off as a bad night after scoring 17 runs and winning in their last two games against the Yankees in New York.
That wasted Soriano’s solid pitching, which allowed one run, struck out seven players and retired the last nine batters he faced.
Although Soriano allowed one run and faced some traffic, that was more due to his teammates’ sloppy infield defense and the Nationals’ speed.
Three of the singles Soriano allowed were on ground balls that were hit too slowly for the Angels’ infielders to throw out runners at first base.
Soriano also caused a ground ball that should have been an inning-ending double play in the first inning, but second baseman Michael Stefanic kicked it out. That led to the Nationals’ only run against him. It was an earned run because the official scorer cannot count it as a double play.
When Soriano’s night was over, he had achieved eight of his outs on ground balls.
Quijada allowed the tying run on a sacrifice fly after allowing two singles in the eighth inning. In the 10th inning, Washington brought in Joyce, its hard-throwing closer, as the Nationals scored the winning run to third base. Joyce got Alex Call to hit a line drive that could have been an out but bounced off Guillorme’s glove.
Washington said Guillorme should have made the play regardless of the spin the ball had when he hit it.
“We’re in the major leagues,” Washington said. “The ball hit his glove. He’s in a position where you make a play with it when the ball comes off the bat. They’re not in the minor leagues.”
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