WASHINGTON – It took a while for the Angels’ offense to get going Saturday, but they finally scored in the late innings against the Nationals’ bullpen to send the game into extra innings. But in the end, it wasn’t enough in a 6-5 loss in 10 innings at Nationals Park.
After rallying from a 4-0 deficit in the eighth and with the game tied 5-5 in the 10th, the Angels had the go-ahead run 90 feet away from home plate in automatic runner Zach Neto. But after a walk to Mike Trout, two groundouts and a strikeout kept the Halos from taking the lead, sending the game to the bottom of the 10th.
With right-hander José Fermin on the mound and Nationals shortstop CJ Abrams as the automatic runner at second, the Angels intentionally walked outfielder Daylen Lile with one out to bring up backup catcher Harry Ford with the possibility of an inning-ending double play.
But Abrams and Lile executed a double-steal, and then Neto couldn’t cleanly field Ford’s hard-hit grounder as Abrams scored the winning run for the home team.
“I tried to make a play, didn’t make it. We lost the game,” Neto said.
The Nationals’ speed on the basepaths in that situation made the task for the Angels’ defense a little more challenging.
“Obviously the ball to Neto, [Abrams] was running. Abrams can run, so it might have sped him up a little bit,” manager Kurt Suzuki said. “I think you just go back before, right? Stealing second and third. If we didn’t let them steal second and third, it’s a double play. Inning’s over. So just the little details like that, we have to take a look at and see how we can improve on that.”
“[Abrams is] a fast guy,” Neto said. “You know he’s going on contact. Just got to make a play, but I didn’t make the play. So we lost.”
The Angels have now lost seven straight extra-inning games, all coming in 10 innings. They are 4-14 in extras this season, with their last win coming on June 24 against the Orioles.
“It’s definitely tough, right? You get yourself in a good spot and you come out on the bottom end,” Suzuki said of his team’s extra-inning woes. “Everybody wants to win, but we’ve got to go back and try to see how we can improve in those areas and get us more opportunities, I guess, to win those.”
Los Angeles’ bats were actually held hitless by Nationals lefty starter and Anaheim native Andrew Alvarez through the first 5 1/3 innings. But the Angels were able to rally to eventually take the lead in the ninth inning against Washington’s bullpen.
A three-run eighth inning was capped by Vaughn Grissom’s two-run home run off right-hander Brad Lord. Grissom’s 11th homer of the season traveled a Statcast-projected 360 feet over the left-field fence to make it a 4-3 game.
Oswald Peraza then drew a leadoff walk against left-hander Will Dion in the ninth, and Denzer Guzman drove him in with a double to the left-field corner to tie the game. After Guzman moved up to third base on a wild pitch, Moisés Ballesteros gave the Angels a 5-4 lead with a sacrifice fly to left. But despite those efforts, the Nats were able to tie the game again in the bottom of the inning off right-hander Ben Joyce.
“It’s awesome. They’ve been doing that all year,” Suzuki said of the Angles’ late rallies. “The offense has been coming up and battling back. Obviously, a slow start against their starting pitcher. So to come back there and not give up, that’s just something that I think we can all be proud of throughout the year. You’d like to definitely win those, but you look at those as positive things.”