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Angels’ slumping hitters manage only 2 hits against Pirates

April 24, 2025

Pittsburgh Pirates starting pitcher Andrew Heaney throws to the plate during the first inning of their game against the Angels on Wednesday, April 23, 2025, at Angel Stadium. Heaney, a former Angel, dominated his old team with six shutout innings, allowing one hit and striking out nine. (Photo by Ronald Martinez/Getty Images)

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ANAHEIM — The same questions have come at Ron Washington after most of the Angels’ games lately, and he continues to give the same answer.

The Angels are not hitting, including a two-hit performance in a 3-0 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates on Wednesday night, and Washington says simply that they will eventually snap out of this.

“All we can do is keep working,” Washington said. “We’re in an offensive funk right now, and it’s up and down the whole lineup. It’s not just in certain parts of the lineup. It’s up and down. It’s our big boys. It’s our little guys. It’s everybody. So we’ve just got to keep working. One day we’ll walk out there in the near future, and we’ll find ourselves offensively.”

Mike Trout, who went 0 for 4 with three strikeouts to drop his season average to .169, said the “energy’s down” since the Angels got off to a hot start. The Angels improved to 8-4 with a 10-run, six-homer outburst on April 10 in Tampa.

Since then, the Angels (11-12) have lost eight of 11 games, dropping under .500 for the first time since they were 0-1. They’ve averaged 2.4 runs in those games, surpassing four runs just once and getting shut out twice.

They’ve hit .186 and struck out in 33% of their plate appearances. The major league average strikeout rate is 22.4%.

“Obviously, things aren’t going our way,” Trout said, “but we’ve got to stay positive, and you know keep pulling for each other.”

Washington said they’ve addressed the hitters as a group, trying to kickstart the offense, but ultimately each player has to do what’s necessary to get out of this rut. He said he’s not worried about their confidence right now.

“They’re confident,” Washington said. “They’re not down on themselves. They know they’re better than what they’re showing, and I know they’re better than what they’re showing. So all we’ll do is keep grinding. We’re only in the first month. If we can get it out right now, I’m good with that. And then we can do what we have to do the rest of the way. We’re just in an offensive funk. It is up and down the lineup, not in one area.”

On Wednesday night it was former Angels left-hander Andrew Heaney who kept them in a funk.

Heaney struck out nine in six innings, including the first six hitters of the game. The Angels didn’t have a baserunner until Travis d’Arnaud doubled with one out in the fifth. Nolan Schanuel then reached on an error, giving the Angels a brief glimmer of a rally.

But Luis Rengifo then hit a fly ball to center and Kyren Paris struck out.

The Angels didn’t have another baserunner until Jorge Soler’s double in the ninth inning.

The offensive outage has put more pressure on Angels pitchers, and on this night right-hander Jack Kochanowicz did all he could to keep the Angels close.

Kochanowicz gave up two runs in six innings, which was an improvement after he’d given up 10 runs in 9⅓ innings in his previous two starts.

“I thought he was real good,” Washington said. “His stuff was crisp tonight. He had a lot of ground balls. He had a lot of traffic throughout the game, but he was able to pitch around it, and that’s who he is. He doesn’t strike out guys. But he did get the ball on the ground a lot tonight. His four-seam was real crisp. And then he came later on in the game and the sinker started working.”

It was a typical Kochanowicz game, in that he only struck out three and walked one. He induced eight groundouts, including three double plays.

There were also plenty of balls that eluded Angels fielders, accounting for eight hits.

The defense had no shot at one of them, a 463-foot homer from Oneil Cruz. Kochanowicz hung a slider and Cruz blasted it at 116.6 mph, bouncing it off the green hitter’s background beyond the trees past the center field fence.

Although Washington acknowledged the hard contact against Kochanowicz, he said he didn’t mind it because of the results.

“He had a lot of hard contact, but he only gave up two runs in six innings,” Washington said. “If every time he takes the ball he gives up two runs in six innings, I will take it.”

After Kochanowicz was finished, left-hander Reid Detmers entered for his best outing of the season.

Detmers pitched two scoreless innings and struck out four, without a walk.

Angels’ slumping hitters manage only 2 hits against Pirates Orange County Register

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Angels’ slumping hitters manage only 2 hits against Pirates

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