Kikuchi's mechanical adjustment pays dividends in scoreless start

ANAHEIM -- Yusei Kikuchi finally looked more like the version of himself who was an All-Star in 2025, and it wasn’t by coincidence.

After struggling in his first four starts of the season, the left-hander turned it around by striking out eight over six scoreless innings in a 4-1 loss to the Padres on Saturday night at Angel Stadium. And Kikuchi said it happened after he reverted to a similar arm angle to last year after experimenting with a higher release point through his first four starts.

"I went over my mechanics this week and I think that brought me good results," Kikuchi said through interpreter Koki Goto. "Going into this season, I raised my arm angle to become a better pitcher, but for the first four games, it didn’t work out well, so I brought back last year’s form. I tried to recall the drills I did, and I think that brought me good results.”

Kikuchi, who had a 3.99 ERA in a career-high 33 starts last season, entered with a 7.50 ERA while averaging just a little more than four innings per outing. But this start marked the first time this season that Kikuchi got through six frames, and he did it efficiently, with 86 pitches and just one walk allowed.

He also did it with better velocity, as his four-seamer reached as high as 98.6 mph and averaged 96.4 mph, which was 1.3 mph higher than his season average. He also threw it 45 percent of the time, which was way up from his season average of 25 percent.

“Kikuchi was pretty amazing,” manager Kurt Suzuki said. “He was throwing hard, he was using his fastball, attacking, and he threw some good curveballs in there. And some sliders and splits and mixed it up. But that’s kind of the Kikuchi that we’re used to seeing, that type of guy where he’s attacking with the fastball.”

As Suzuki noted, Kikuchi paired it with his new splitter, cutter, curveball and slider to keep Padres hitters off-balance. He registered 12 swings and misses, including three with his four-seamer, three with the splitter, three with the cutter, two with his curve and one with his slider.

“I feel like I was able to throw naturally without thinking about the mechanics, and my usage of fastballs came naturally,” Kikuchi said. “The four-seam was good, but I was also able to get swing-and-misses from the splitters, too, so I think that combination worked out well.”

Kikuchi pitched out of a jam in the third, when he surrendered back-to-back singles to Freddy Fermin and Jake Cronenworth to bring up the top of San Diego’s order. But he struck out Ramón Laureano looking with a 3-2 cutter before getting Fernando Tatis Jr. to line into a double play to third baseman Oswald Peraza on a 1-0 curveball below the zone.

He also pitched around a leadoff double from Miguel Andujar in the fifth, keyed by striking out Fermin with a 2-2 slider and Laureano with a 1-2 splitter. He added two more strikeouts as part of a 1-2-3 sixth and Suzuki felt he had seen enough from Kikuchi and went to his bullpen.

“Obviously he’s been grinding and trying to get back on track,” Suzuki said. “We felt like six innings, no runs, eight strikeouts was a good building block and it was a good night for him.”

Right-hander Ryan Zeferjahn got through a scoreless seventh, keyed by a double play, but went back out for the eighth after having thrown just eight pitches. The decision backfired, as he issued back-to-back walks to open the frame before giving up a go-ahead RBI single to Laureano and an RBI single to Tatis on a weakly hit grounder as part of a hit-and-run.

Nick Sandlin relieved Zeferjahn and was able to limit the damage but went back out for the ninth and gave up two runs after the Angels had made it a one-run game with a two-out RBI single from Nolan Schanuel in the eighth.

It made the ninth all that more challenging against closer Mason Miller, who entered with a 0.00 ERA and just one hit and one walk allowed with 23 strikeouts in 9 1/3 innings. The Angels managed to get a hit and draw a four-pitch walk against him but ultimately couldn’t score against the flamethrower.

“These guys keep going, they keep putting the pressure on,” Suzuki said. “We got two guys on, the tying run comes to the plate twice, two shots at it against the best closer in the game. So these guys keep fighting.”