Ohtani fans hitters with his go-to splitter
The Angels did well to take Shohei Ohtani off the hook for a loss on a day the two-way star threw one of his better games of the season, an eight-inning, tworun, five-hit, 10-strikeout effort in which he threw a career-high 55 split-fingered fastballs, inducing 17 swinging strikes with the sharpbreaking pitch.
But a two-run rally to tie the score in the bottom of the ninth only seemed to delay the inevitable — the Oakland Athletics pushed across a run in the 10th inning for a 3-2 victory before 22,456 in Angel Stadium, completing a three-game sweep that improved Oakland to 15-4 against the Angels this season.
“Nobody keeps track of moral victories,” Angels manager Joe Maddon said of the comeback, “but when you’re trying to ascend, that doesn’t get lost on me.”
Ohtani fell short in a bid for his 10th win of the season, but at least he didn’t suffer a loss after matching his career high for innings, whiffing 10 or more for the fifth time in his career and throwing 72 of his 108 pitches for strikes.
The right-hander retired the side in order in the first and fifth innings and struck out the side — Seth Brown, Yan Gomes and Elvis Andrus — on splitters in the seventh.
He escaped a basesloaded, one-out jam in the eighth by getting Jed Lowrie to pop out to shortstop and striking out Matt Chapman with a splitter, two pitches after throwing a 99-mph fastball on his 106th pitch of the game.
His only two mistakes were a hanging slider that Gomes hit for a 420-foot solo homer to center in the third and a grooved 95-mph fastball that Chapman crushed for a 425-foot solo shot to center in the fourth.
“Overall, I felt good with all of my pitches commandwise,” Ohtani said through an interpreter. “Just those two pitches I gave up for home runs were very regrettable.”
The Angels managed one hit — Brandon Marsh’s twoout double in the third — in seven innings off A’s starter Frankie Montas and went down in order against lefthander Jake Diekman in the eighth.
Third baseman Jack Mayfield preserved the 2-0 deficit when he raced in from the shortstop spot — where he was shifted — to catch Matt Olson’s popup between the mound and home plate with the bases loaded to end the top of the ninth.
Phil Gosselin led off the bottom of the ninth with a double to left off Sergio Romo, and Jared Walsh tapped a grounder to a vacated shortstop spot for an infield single, advancing Gosselin to third.
Luis Rengifo’s hard grounder to first was bobbled by Olson, who touched the bag for an out, Gosselin holding and Walsh taking second.
Jose Rojas stroked an RBI single to right to cut the lead to 2-1. Walsh was held by third base coach Brian Butterfield but scored for a 2-2 tie when Brown’s throw from right sailed over the catcher’s head and to the backstop.
Rojas took second on the throw but was stranded when Lou Trivino replaced Romo and struck out Max Stassi and Mayfield to end the ninth. The A’s scored in the 10th on Lowrie’s sacrifice fly, and Trivino threw a scoreless bottom of the 10th.
Double-A Pandas cancel final games
The Rocket City Trash Pandas, the Angels’ double-A affiliate in Madison, Ala., canceled its final two regular-season home games against Pensacola because of COVID-19 testing and contact tracing.
The team finished its inaugural season with a 54-56 record.