Angels start fast, hold off A's to snap skid

The Angels have had trouble in the early innings this season, but on Saturday they got ahead first and were able to hold the lead and end a four-game losing streak.

David Fletcher and Mike Trout helped the Angels jump out to an early 4-0 lead, and it was enough in a 4-3 win over the A's at the Oakland Coliseum. The Angels entered the game having been outscored by a 37-15 margin in the first two innings, including allowing three runs in the opening frame of Friday's 5-3 loss. The Angels improved to 8-6 when they score first; they've had trouble with comebacks this year, going just 1-13 when the opposing team scores first.

• Box score

"We've been looking for that to get done and it matters," Angels manager Joe Maddon said. "If you don't pitch, you're always caught in that moment of trying to play catch-up and it's hard. It's a mentally difficult place to play baseball, so it was good."

But on Saturday, the Angels jumped on right-hander Chris Bassitt early, and he wasn't helped by sloppy defense from the A's. Fletcher was a sparkplug yet again in the first, doubling to left on the second pitch of the game. He went to third on a sacrifice bunt from Tommy La Stella and then made an aggressive baserunning move on a Trout grounder hit to third. But Fletcher's bold decision to go home on the grounder paid off, as catcher Austin Allen couldn't handle the off-target one-hop throw from third baseman Matt Chapman.

“We had the contact play on,” Maddon said. “The ball was hit awkwardly to Chapman, who’s outstanding. I totally believe it was the fact with how Fletch runs that probably caused Chapman to speed up that internal clock a little bit, which permitted us to have that run.”

The Angels scored three more runs in the second, with rookie Jo Adell connecting on his first career extra-base hit with a leadoff double. Luis Rengifo singled on a soft grounder to Chapman with one out to put two runners on for Fletcher. But Chapman made another rare mistake, as he couldn't handle a potential double-play ball hit by Fletcher for an error that brought home another run. It set up a two-run double from Trout that was stung into the left-field gap with an exit velocity of 111.4 mph, per Statcast.

“That thing was scalded,” Maddon said. “It was absolutely mangled. It came off hot.”

The offense backed right-hander Griffin Canning, who was better than his last two starts but couldn't get through five innings. Canning went 4 2/3 innings, allowing three runs on six hits and two walks to see his ERA rise to 4.88 on the year.

It was the bullpen that came through in a huge way, with Matt Andriese throwing 2 1/3 scoreless innings in relief of Canning. Ty Buttrey threw a 1-2-3 eighth aided by a diving catch from Trout to take away a hit from Matt Olson, and he went back out for the ninth to complete a six-out save.

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Buttrey came away impressed by Trout’s catch, as Trout doesn’t usually dive for balls and if he had missed it, it would have put a runner in scoring position to open the inning.

“He looked like he had it all the way and then for like a second it looked like it was about to drop,” Buttrey said. “The last thing I need, the last thing anyone needs, is Mike to dive for a ball that he doesn't really need to dive for.”

Buttrey, who has essentially become the club's closer, threw just 19 pitches and should be available for the series finale on Sunday. The 9-19 Angels are looking to win back-to-back games for just the second time this year, so Buttrey felt like Saturday's win was a big one.

"It means a lot,” Buttrey said. “When we're struggling, like we were doing the last couple games, you go out there against a good team and finally get some momentum going. We had really great at-bats, timely hitting, good pitching. That's just the tip of the iceberg for what I feel like this team can do, and everyone knows that.”