ANAHEIM -- As the start of August approached, right-hander Ryan Johnson had struggled most of the year with a 7.63 ERA in 46 innings, but something has clicked for the rookie since then.
Johnson has put together an impressive stretch that shows some promise for the future, including throwing six strong innings in a 2-1 win over the Mariners on Tuesday night at Angel Stadium. He gave up just one run on six hits and no walks with seven strikeouts to continue his stellar finish to the year.
Over his last eight starts, Johnson has posted a 2.03 ERA with 33 strikeouts in 44 1/3 innings, showing much improvement and the ability to attack the strike zone. Overall, he's posted a 4.88 ERA with 70 strikeouts in 90 1/3 innings, and is trying to show that he can stick as a starter going forward.
He’s excelled under interim pitching coach Tim Leveque, as Johnson has been able to keep up his unorthodox throwing routine that the previous coaches didn’t allow him to do. Johnson, who has plenty of funk in his delivery, is a fan of throwing long toss from foul pole to foul pole in between starts to keep his arm loose.
Johnson threw 16 straight strikes to open his outing on Tuesday, and 67 of his 90 total pitches were for strikes. He consistently got ahead of hitters, throwing first-pitch strikes to 18 of the 25 batters he faced.
He retired the first seven batters of the game before he got into a jam in the third inning, loading the bases with two outs. But he got Dominic Canzone to pop up to end the scoring threat. Johnson also found himself in trouble in the fourth with two runners on and two outs, but struck out Lazaro Montes to get out of the inning.
The lone run he surrendered came in the sixth, when Canzone reached on a leadoff triple that hit off Mike Trout’s glove in center field. Canzone scored on a hard-hit double from Julio Rodríguez with one out, but Johnson was able to wriggle out of trouble once again, getting Josh Naylor to fly out before a groundout from Cole Young.
Johnson received just enough run support, with Vaughn Grissom connecting on an RBI double in the fifth and Josh Lowe smacking a go-ahead solo blast in the sixth. It helped Johnson outduel right-hander Logan Gilbert to give the Angels the series win.