Angels rally for 3 runs in 9th, outlast Rangers in 10 innings for 5th straight win

ANAHEIM — If it was not jet lag then perhaps it was travel slog that had the Angels in a funk and kept them dragging until the last possible moment Friday night.

Down to their last out and nearly reduced to their last strike, the Angels found a way to rally for an improbable 5-4 victory in a series opener against the Texas Rangers to improve their winning streak to a season-best five games.

The Angels scored three runs in the ninth inning, all with two outs, to tie the game then scored on a wild pitch in the 10th inning to win it. Chad Wallach had a two-run double in the ninth and Zach Neto came home in the 10th when Rangers right-hander Josh Sborz bounced a ball to the backstop on his first pitch of the game with Anthony Rendon at the plate.

“I’ve seen stranger things,” Manager Phil Nevin said. “We were hoping for anything there. I felt like I had the right guy at the plate too with Anthony. No matter who is on the mound I think he is still probably the best in baseball getting a guy in from third base. I’ll take them any way I can get them.”

After a day game in St. Louis on Thursday to cap a three-game sweep of the Cardinals, the Angels finally got to unpacking their fiery temperament before it was too late.

In a game when everything seemed to go against them, the Angels had just two hits through seven innings and both of those were singles. They gave up two runs in a haunted fourth inning that included a Rangers hit batter with an 0-and-2 count, a collision in foul territory while on defense and a ball that was lost in a bluish-gray sky at dusk that seemed to match the mood.

But in the ninth inning against Rangers left-hander Will Smith (0-2) while trailing 4-1, Rendon led off with a single. All seemed lost when the Angels made two quick outs, but Brandon Drury kept the game alive with a single.

Wallach, who had just entered the game in the top of the inning, then knocked a drive to the opposite field in right to score two runs and bring the Angels within 4-3. Luis Rengifo’s broken-bat dunker into shallow left-center field drove in Wallach to tie the score.

“It was awesome,” Wallach said. “To bring it within one, to hit a double in a situation like that, it got me pumped up and the guys in the dugout too. It was pretty cool.”

Angels right-hander Carlos Estevez (1-1) got through the 10th inning, stranding two Rangers runners.

Angels starter Tyler Anderson didn’t help himself with five walks, but as much as he could have used better control, he also would have benefited from a decent good-luck charm.

With Texas leading 1-0, the Rangers’ fourth inning began when Ezequiel Duran fell into an 0-and-2 hole against Anderson. But that advantage was turned on the next pitch when Duran was hit in the left elbow by an Anderson fastball. Leody Taveras then walked to put two runners aboard.

The Angels seemed to catch a break when Bubba Thompson’s sacrifice bunt attempt was popped up foul. And while catcher Matt Thaiss was able to make a play on the ball for the first out, he took a blow to the chin from the shoulder of a charging Rendon.

Thaiss remained in the game but the fun house was only starting to inflict pain. The Rangers’ Marcus Semien followed with what appeared to be a routine fly ball to left field, but Taylor Ward lost track of it and the ground-rule double scored Duran for a 2-0 lead.

“The ball that got lost in the sky, you hear people yelling and booing, but there is nothing you can do about that,” Nevin said. “It’s impossible to see when it gets above the lights. But Tyler pitched his butt off through that inning and got us through it.”

Texas’ Nathaniel Lowe grounded a ball to shortstop, but Neto misfired on his throw to first base for his first error in 20 major-league games. The bad throw came two days after a finger injury on Neto’s throwing hand. Taveras scored on that play for a 3-0 lead.

“Sometimes things don’t go your way out there and your job is to keep trying to stay out there and make quality pitches the best you can and keep us in the game,” Anderson said of limiting the fourth-inning damage. “Hopefully you have a chance like that to come back and do some damage and win. It was great.”

Lowe drove in an eighth-inning run to extend the Rangers’ lead to 4-0 but the Angels got that back on Mike Trout’s bloop RBI single to right-center to pull within 4-1.

Stay connected with us on social media platform for instant update click here to join our T witter, & Facebook

We are now on Telegram. Click here to join our channel (@TechiUpdate) and stay updated with the latest Technology headlines.

For all the latest Sports News Click Here

Read original article here

Denial of responsibility! Rapidtelecast.com is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.