Game 57: Angels 5, Rays 9

Just one game after the Angels recorded an impressive 4-3 victory over Tampa Bay, the Halos fell to the Rays by a score of 9-5 on Wednesday night. The loss put the team at 4-4 on their nine game roadtrip.

Tonight’s starter John Lackey, who had a 9-1 record and 2.36 ERA in 11 career start against Tampa, had a rough time against the defending A.L. champions. In five innings, Lackey allowed an astronomically high nine runs and eleven hits. Not exactly what Mike Scioscia was expecting out of his number one starter.

But while the starting pitching had a rough time on Wednesday night, the offense wasn’t too bad. Seven of the nine batters recorded a hit and eight batters reached base. It wasn’t an offensive slugfest, but when you’re an Angels fan you don’t expect one. to occur and will take what you can get.

Here are some more thoughts:

• I hate artificial turf. It has cut Vladimir Guerrero’s career short after he played for many years on it Montreal. Now, it is jeopardizing the health of Torii Hunter, who sat out tonight’s game after he aggravated a groin injury while playing on the turf in Toronto last week. It would be nice if MLB could get rid of it.
• Finally the Angels got some extra base hits, 5 total. Again, I’ll take what I can get from this rag-tag bunch.
• Despite all the doom and gloom articles, Vladimir Guerrero had a solid game last night. Going 2-for-5 with a triple . Hopefully, he can keep improving.