Detmers continues hot stretch in win over Diamondbacks
Jack Janes
Host · Writer
Another start, another opportunity for left-hander Reid Detmers to continue to lower his ERA down to where the Angels believe his potential could be. And on Tuesday night, Detmers did just that.
A month ago, Detmers’ ERA stood at 5.07, and doubts about his return to the rotation from the bullpen continued to grow.
After his latest gem of seven innings of shutout ball on only three hits and no walks in the Angels’ 7-0 win over the Diamondbacks on Tuesday, Detmers’ ERA on the season is now a respectable 3.68.
Over his last five starts, Detmers has allowed five earned runs in 33 innings (1.36 ERA) with 39 strikeouts and only five walks.
Detmers has now crossed the 100 strikeout plateau in just 88 innings. He’s the third pitcher in baseball and the first American League pitcher to get to 100 strikeouts this season.
Although Detmers dominated the box score yet again, he found an alternate path to that success. Detmers only struck out two batters and relied on groundballs to get outs.
It wasn’t necessarily Detmers’ fault for the lack of strikeouts. Heading into play on Tuesday, the Diamondbacks’ 20.2% strikeout rate is the third-lowest mark in all of baseball.
He limited hard contact all night long and logged eight groundouts.
A huge key to his success in getting weak contact was Detmers’ ability to be a strike-one machine. He landed a first-pitch strike 19 out of 24 times on the night.
It was also a night that the Angels’ offense enjoyed some much-needed consistency.
The lineup tagged the Diamondbacks for seven runs on 14 hits, including a stretch where they scored a run in five consecutive innings.
It was the big dogs and the bottom of the lineup that contributed for the Angels.
At the bottom of the order, the seven, eight and nine hole hitters combined for seven hits in 12 at-bats.
Rookie Denzer Guzman had a pair of two-strike knocks and scored twice. Logan O’Hoppe stayed hot and picked up another three hits to make him 11-for-23 (.478) in his last eight games. Donovan Walton came through with two RBI singles and is now 9-for-16 (.563) in his last five games.
At the top, Zach Neto and Mike Trout each homered and got two hits. Neto narrowly missed a second home run of the day when he launched a ball 406 feet to dead center, but it clanked off the wall just below the yellow line, and he settled for a triple. Trout’s second hit was an RBI double.
