ARLINGTON -- The Angels have reason to believe they have the real José Soriano back, even if he never really left.
In Tuesday night’s 8-3 loss to the Rangers, for the second consecutive outing, Soriano resembled the hard-throwing righty who blazed through April en route to the American League Pitcher of the Month Award with an 0.84 ERA in seven starts. That’s a much more attractive version for the Angels than the often-wild incarnation from May and June, when he walked batters at a rate of 5.75 per nine innings and posted a 5.34 ERA.
After six solid innings Tuesday, following up a nine-strikeout performance in Seattle six days earlier, the Soriano of July is shaping up nicely. He struck out four and walked two, allowing two earned runs.
“I thought he pitched great,” Angels manager Kurt Suzuki said. “He attacked the zone, his curveball was working, he got some early contacts and soft contacts. .... He’s put up a couple of good ones, and you like where he’s at. It’s definitely been positive the last two times he’s been out.”
Soriano has relied more on his knuckle-curve and splitter than previously over the past two starts. He didn’t have as much swing-and-miss stuff Tuesday as in his sharpest outings this season -- Soriano entered with a 93rd percentile whiff rate (33.2 percent) -- but he allowed only five hard-hit balls, including the only two hits he gave up, both singles.
“He’s been having a good feel for those two pitches, so we try to ride what’s been working for him a little bit and [it’s] giving him some success,” Suzuki said.
Soriano came in with the highest walk rate (11.6 percent) among qualified starters in the AL, and after two walks to the Rangers, he still leads the AL with 51 free passes this season. A pair of one-out walks in the second inning -- on a total of nine pitches -- set up Nicky Lopez’s two-run single before Soriano settled in for the rest of his outing.
With two outs in the second, Angels third baseman Denzer Guzman almost had a play on Lopez’s 97.2-mph grounder, but Guzman was playing in, almost on the grass, and had virtually no time to react.
After that, Soriano retired 13 out of the final 14 hitters he faced. He threw 93 pitches (56 strikes) and managed to fight back despite falling behind on the first pitch to 12 of 23 batters.
“Sometimes we lose a little bit of command; that happens. ... Just keep working and not focusing on the bad things,” Soriano said.
In the first inning, the Angels quickly grabbed a 2-0 lead off Rangers starter Jacob deGrom, who left the game after throwing only 80 pitches in five innings. The Halos briefly led again after manufacturing a seventh-inning run: Oswald Peraza singled and stole second, scoring on Wade Meckler's single.
But reliever Tayler Saucedo surrendered a leadoff homer on the eighth pitch of the at-bat to Rangers pinch-hitter Justin Foscue in their half of the seventh. The Angels let the tie slip away when Saucedo’s replacement, Sam Bachman, gave up five earned runs on six hits in the eighth.
“It looked like he left some balls up and they didn’t miss it,” Suzuki said of Bachman. “They battled and found ways to put the ball in play.”
With the loss in the series opener at Globe Life Field, the Angels’ losing streak extended to seven games, tying for their longest skid this season.
“Seven in a row is definitely tough. ... We know there’s going to be some ups and downs, and in this game, you’re going to go through those,” Suzuki said. “It’s how you respond to them. That’s what we try to teach them.”