The Los Angeles Angels went all-in at the MLB trade deadline by acquiring Lucas Giolito, Reynaldo López, Randal Grichuk, C.J. Cron and Dominic Leone as an effort to advance to the postseason for the first time since 2014.
The Angels had been playing better baseball at the time of the deals, moving to within three games of the Toronto Blue Jays for the final American League Wild Card spot.
However, L.A. has since hit another rough patch by dropping six consecutive games after being swept by the Seattle Mariners over the weekend at Angel Stadium. Adding insult to injury was the fact that the Angels lost all four games by a combined six runs.
Angels outfielder Mickey Moniak believes the team’s struggles with runners in scoring position cost them a chance to steal a game or two, per Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com:
“Getting swept is never fun,” outfielder Mickey Moniak said. “But that’s baseball and we have to wake up tomorrow ready to go. But it’s tough on everybody. We’re trying to put in as much work as possible to be successful. It was just a tough series. We were in every game. And obviously not coming through with runners in scoring position is tough.”
Angels manager Phil Nevin echoed similar sentiments and believes the team had many opportunities to put runs on the board:
“Awful,” Nevin said. “There’s no other way to put it. We had our chances to score. It’s not the call’s fault, but it certainly changes the dynamic of that inning. Terrible. But like I said, that’s not the reason why we lost. We had chances to score. We had opportunities to put the bat on the ball and we didn’t.”
In the wake of being swept by the Mariners, the Angels fell to 56-57 and are now 10.5 games behind the first-place Texas Rangers in the AL West. L.A. is also seven games behind the Blue Jays in the Wild Card standings, with the Mariners, New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox in front of them.
A bright spot for the Angels is that there are 49 games remaining in the regular season. If the team goes on a hot streak, they can close the gap on the aforementioned teams and potentially sneak into the playoffs.
In order for that to happen, the Angels will need to quickly regroup before they begin a three-game series with the San Francisco Giants on Monday. After that, the team will play six pivotal games against the Rangers and Houston Astros on the road.
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