Baseball is cruel. One day you drop 27 runs on Oakland, and the next, your bats go completely cold. That is exactly what happened to the Angels on Monday night. They got embarrassed. A 6-1 drubbing by the Baltimore Orioles was only salvaged by a meaningless, lead-off home run by Jorge Soler in the ninth inning. Before that? Nothing.
It started with a tease. Nolan Schanuel and Jo Adell singled back-to-back in the first, putting runners on first and second with one out. Then, the threat evaporated. The lineup spent the rest of the night looking utterly lost. They scratched out seven hits, drew a single walk, and struck out ten times. Only two runners even sniffed scoring position all night. Manager Kurt Suzuki tried to put a brave face on it, claiming his guys were just missing early-count pitches. ‘Just off the barrel stuff,’ Suzuki muttered. Sure.
The man holding the scalpel was Kyle Bradish. He used to be in the Angels’ system. Now, the Orioles right-hander is just another painful reminder of what got away. Bradish carved up his former club over eight scoreless innings, striking out nine and walking just one. He owned the deep counts. Suzuki wondered aloud if his hitters were guessing. Whatever they were doing, it did not work.
On the mound for Anaheim, rookie left-hander Sam Aldegheri learned how fast things can go south. Taylor Ward, back in Angel Stadium after eight years in the home clubhouse, greeted him with a lead-off home run. Welcome back. Aldegheri settled down to retire the next nine, but the wheels fell off in the fourth. A walk, a single, and then Coby Mayo launched a three-run blast. Just like that, it was 4-0. One bad pitch. That is all it takes.
Aldegheri did not survive the fifth. He loaded the bases, surrendered a sacrifice fly to Pete Alonso, and got yanked. ‘I’m not satisfied, it’s frustrating,’ the rookie said, clearly pissed off about a walk he gave to Gunnar Henderson. Henderson later added a triple off Brent Suter in the seventh to make it 6-0. By the time Soler hit his solo shot in the ninth, the stadium was mostly empty. Just another night at the ballpark.
