ANAHEIM -- After a sophomore slump last year coming off a solid showing as a rookie, right-hander Jack Kochanowicz seems to have recaptured his form from 2024 early this season.
Kochanowicz didn’t have his best stuff and struck out just one but got through 5 2/3 innings, allowing one run on five hits and two walks in a 4-2 loss to the Blue Jays on Tuesday night at Angel Stadium. Through five starts this year, he has a 3.10 ERA with 19 strikeouts and 17 walks in 29 innings after posting a 6.81 ERA with 72 strikeouts and 58 walks surrendered across 111 innings in 2025.
“I felt good,” Kochanowicz said. “I felt like I kept us in the game pretty well, but I wouldn't say the stuff felt the best today. But just some deep breaths at the right times got me through some things.”
The 25-year-old is delivering results more like he did two years ago when he had a 3.99 ERA with 25 strikeouts and 10 walks in 65 1/3 innings. He’s improved his strikeout rate substantially since then, though he has also seen an increase in his walk rate. He’ll need to improve his control going forward. But the sinkerballer has been helped by allowing just one homer this season after surrendering 21 last season.
“Jack was good,” manager Kurt Suzuki said. “Throwing strikes and keeping them on the ground. Just making some good pitches and kept us in the game the whole time.”
As Suzuki noted, he mostly kept the ball on the ground against the Blue Jays, as he recorded 10 outs on via grounders, including two double plays, compared to just two fly-ball outs. His lone strikeout came in the sixth, when he opened the frame by getting Ernie Clement with a 3-2 sinker.
“They were very aggressive,” Kochanowicz said. “When teams come out swinging like that, I kind of have to play into that game. And it's like, ‘All right, you're gonna swing and I'm gonna throw it.’”
But he then allowed a hard-hit grounder by Vladimir Guerrero Jr. at third baseman Oswald Peraza, who was able to field the hot shot but couldn’t complete the play, as first baseman Nolan Schanuel couldn’t handle the throw. Toronto quickly capitalized with a single from Jesús Sánchez to put runners at the corners with one out.
Kochanowicz got ahead of Eloy Jiménez with two sinkers for strikes before giving up a game-tying sacrifice fly on an 0-2 slider inside and off the plate. It was the last batter for Kochanowicz, as he was replaced by right-hander Sam Bachman after having thrown 88 pitches.
“I tried to get that down and away more and I didn't,” Kochanowicz said. “It was the right pitch, just the wrong spot.”
Bachman pitched well in relief, getting out of the inning and throwing 1 1/3 scoreless frames. However, lefty Drew Pomeranz struggled in the eighth. He gave up a one-out double to Clement before the Angels intentionally walked Guerrero to get to the left-handed-hitting Sánchez.
The Blue Jays countered by bringing in pinch-hitter Lenyn Sosa, who promptly ripped a two-run double to right to put the Blue Jays ahead. Jiménez followed with an RBI single to make it a three-run lead for Toronto, as Pomeranz allowed hits to three right-handed batters in the inning.
“We like Pom against their best guys,” Suzuki said. “He really executed his pitches. Clement did a good job of hitting a ball for a double and Sosa, who hit that ball to the gap, which was a good piece of hitting. And they rolled one through the right side. I feel like Pom threw the ball good, it's just one of those nights.”
It proved to be too much for the scuffling offense in their four straight defeat, as the Angels managed just five hits on the night and scored their lone run on a sacrifice fly from Vaughn Grissom in the fifth after being held hitless by veteran lefty Patrick Corbin for the first four innings.
They rallied late in the ninth, loading the bases against closer Jeff Hoffman after he hit two batters before Yoán Moncada delivered a pinch-hit RBI single. Schanuel, though, grounded into a double play on the first pitch he saw from right-hander Louis Varland on a close play that stood after a review.
“We got the right guys up at that time to win the game,” Suzuki said. “We had two lefties coming up, but he executed a pitch and got Nolan to ground out.”