The Angels had the lead, had the baserunners and had the game right where they wanted it. None of it mattered in the end.
Los Angeles fell 4-3 to the Cleveland Guardians on Wednesday in Anaheim, giving away a three-run advantage and losing the series after letting another lead slip away for the second straight game. The Angels scored first, but the night turned into another one of those frustrating finishes where the offense couldn’t add on and the bullpen couldn’t hold the line.
The opening run came in a messy way, not by a clean burst of production from the bats. Zach Neto led off with a single and wound up scoring from first when Cleveland pitcher Joey Cantillo mishandled a routine ground ball from Vaughn Grissom, then threw it past his first baseman and into right field.
Cantillo’s problems only got worse from there. In the bottom of the second, he walked three of the first four batters he faced, loading the bases.
Neto was then hit by a pitch to force in a run, and Mike Trout added a sacrifice fly to make it 3-0 Angels. After that, though, Los Angeles stopped scoring.
The Angels did plenty to create chances. They drew eight walks and put traffic on the bases all game, but they came away with just three hits and stranded six runners.
"We had them on the ropes a lot. A lot of free passes, a lot of traffic on the bases... The big hit eluded us today," Angels manager Kurt Suzuki said.
While the Angels stalled, Cleveland chipped away. The Guardians scored once against starter Grayson Rodriguez and added another run off Sammy Peralta in the top of the eighth, trimming the lead to 3-2 and setting up a tense ninth.
With Ben Joyce unavailable after pitching the previous day, Suzuki went to Ryan Watson to finish it. That move unraveled quickly.
Watson got the first out, then gave up three straight hits, including a ground-rule double to Steven Kwan that tied the game at 3-3. Travis Bazzana followed with a sacrifice fly to bring home the go-ahead run and put Cleveland ahead for the first time all night.
"Just didn't execute pitches and that's bottom line," Watson said of the loss. "You can't go out there and expect to put zeroes with leaving pitches over the middle of the plate, which is what I did today... This one's on me."
Cleveland finished with a 12-3 edge in hits, and the Angels never answered in the bottom of the ninth. The loss was Los Angeles’ fifth in six games.
"They're [Cleveland] tough. Tough at-bats over there and we gave ourselves a chance to win, just couldn't finish it off," Suzuki said.
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