Zach Neto’s late homer propels Angels past Pirates
ANAHEIM — When they were finally able to put the Pittsburgh Pirates to bed on Thursday night, the Angels handed out neck pillows and airline blankets.
After ending a 17-inning scoreless streak, while not leading until the 26th inning of the 27-inning series, the Angels avoided a sweep with a 4-3 victory on Zach Neto’s go-ahead home run in the eighth inning.
The reward? To board a red-eye flight for the opener of a three-game series against the Minnesota Twins that starts Friday. It will be a race to see what happens first: the sun rising in the Midwest or the Angels’ plane landing on the runway.
Get in. Get to bed. Get up. Play ball.
“It’s a momentum booster going into this flight,” Neto said. “It’s going to be a lot of adversity with what we’ve got coming up, but we’re here for it. We already talked about it in the clubhouse: Try not to complain about anything. It is what it is, and we have to do what we have to do.”
At least the dreams will be sweet, even if the sleeping conditions are not, after Neto hit his second home run in his sixth game after a return from shoulder surgery. Just as key was a three-run fourth inning when the Angels scored for the first time since the fourth inning on Tuesday.
Mike Trout led off the fourth on Thursday with a triple on a sinking line drive that eluded Pirates right fielder Bryan Reynolds. A Taylor Ward RBI single ended the scoring drought and a two-run home run from Logan O’Hoppe to right field erased the Angels’ early 3-0 deficit.
It was O’Hoppe’s sixth home run of the season to tie Ward for second on the club, two behind Trout. It was also his first home run since a streak of homers in four consecutive games from April 2-6.
“It’s good. It’s nothing new, though,” O’Hoppe said. “We know what we’re capable of doing, so it was good to see it come to fruition. It’s obviously been a tough couple of days, but no one is surprised about tonight.”
The victory means the Angels are now 5-0 in games started by left-hander Tyler Anderson, who stumbled at the outset before settling into six strong innings when he gave up three runs on six hits with no walks and a strikeout.
“I felt like early on, I was making bad pitches and falling behind,” Anderson said. “I wasn’t doing a good job competing in the zone. Not that it got too much better, but I was trying to be in the zone more early and not fall behind too much.”
O’Hoppe said Anderson never really was completely in a flow but he still managed to retire the last 11 batters he faced.
“There were some pitch-com (issues) that threw us off early and I’m not saying that’s the blame, but it definitely threw off the rhythm and flow of our gameplan,” O’Hoppe said. “I thought even after he settled in, he still was working through some things, but he did a good job of getting outs while he was doing it.”
The Pirates took a 1-0 lead when Oneil Cruz crushed Anderson’s second pitch of the game deep to right field for a 398-foot homer. That blast came a day after Cruz mashed a 463-foot home run.
Pittsburgh scored again in the opening inning when veteran Andrew McCutchen doubled and scored on a ground ball from Ke’Bryan Hayes.
In the second inning, the Pirates’ Matt Gorski not only led off with a home run, he opened his career with a long ball in his first trip to the plate after he was recalled earlier in the day. He became the first Pirates player to hit a home run in his first career at-bat since Starling Marte in 2012.
With the Angels’ bullpen contributing three scoreless innings, the tie game set the stage for Neto’s heroics when he launched a 1-and-2 pitch from Pirates right-hander Chase Shugart over the short wall down the left-field line.
“I would say it is a sigh of relief, thinking I knew I had it back and getting humbled really quick early in this series,” said Neto, whose three-hit game was his first of the season and 12th of his career. “I was chasing pitches and doing things I wasn’t doing on my rehab assignments. It was getting back to the basics, hitting my pitch and I had a pretty good day.”
Right-hander Kenley Jansen pitched the ninth inning for his sixth save in six chances with his new club as the final out was recorded on a 119.6-mph line drive from Cruz to Trout in right. Jansen’s 453rd career save moved him 25 behind Lee Smith for third-most all-time.
With the team about to board buses for the airport, Manager Ron Washington was asked if the overnight travel will at least be a little more comfortable now.
“No,” he said. “But it’s nice to have a win. That flight’s not going to be comfortable but I’m going to do the best I can to get some sleep. Getting in at 6 in the morning, I’m going to get more sleep and I’m going to go to the ballpark ready to win a ballgame.”