Christopher Morel hit a go-ahead home run to lead off the seventh inning and Junior Caminero homered twice as the visiting Tampa Bay Rays spoiled another record-setting day by Mike Trout with a 5-4 victory over the Los Angeles Angels on Wednesday afternoon.
Nick Fortes also homered, Jonny DeLuca tripled and Brandon Lowe had two hits for Tampa Bay, which claimed its second series win since the All-Star break.
Garrett Cleavinger (1-4) picked up the win with a scoreless inning of relief and Pete Fairbanks pitched a 1-2-3 ninth to record his 19th save.
Trout hit a three-run homer, the 398th of his career, moving him into a tie with Dale Murphy for 61st place on the all-time home run list. It was Trout’s 200th career homer at Anaheim Stadium, putting him in the record books as the first player in major league history to compile 100 stolen bases and 200 home runs in the same stadium.
He and Luis Rengifo both went 2-for-4 with a run scored for Los Angeles.
Ryan Zeferjahn (6-4) suffered the loss for the Angels, who finished a 13-game homestand with just a 6-7 record. Starter Tyler Anderson left after allowing four runs, including three home runs, on five hits in four innings to extend his team record to 19 straight starts without a victory.
Tampa Bay took a 2-0 lead in the first inning on a two-run homer by Caminero, a 447-foot drive to left-center, driving in Chandler Simpson, who had singled.
Fortes made it 3-0 in the second inning with his third home run. Caminero then extended the lead to 4-0 in the third with his 30th home run of the season and second of the game, a 404-foot drive to center.
Los Angeles tied the game 4-4 in the bottom of the third on Trout’s 20th homer, a 433-foot three-run drive into the bullpen in left. It followed an RBI single by Nolan Schanuel.
Morel, who had struck out in his six previous at-bats in the series, put the Rays back ahead, 5-4, in the seventh when he hit Zeferjahn’s first pitch into the seats down the left field line for his eighth home run.
The Angels loaded the bases with no outs in the eighth against reliever Griffin Jax on an infield single by Trout, a walk by Taylor Ward and catcher interference to put Jo Adell on base. But Jax rebounded with consecutive strikeouts of Logan O’Hoppe, Rengifo and Christian Moore to end the threat.
–Field Level Media
