Los Angeles right-hander Kyle Hendricks will vie for his 100th career victory on Sunday afternoon when the Angels meet the Miami Marlins in the finale of a three-game series in Anaheim, Calif.
Hendricks (2-5, 5.32 ERA) inched closer to the milestone in his last outing, albeit with a tough performance. He allowed four runs on nine hits — including two homers — in 5 2/3 innings in a 7-5 victory over the Athletics on Tuesday.
Hendricks is 3-2 with a 2.17 ERA in nine career starts against Miami. But in his two meetings versus the Marlins last season, he gave up a total of seven earned runs and 13 hits in 8 2/3 innings for an 0-1 record and 7.27 ERA.
Right-hander Edward Cabrera (0-1, 5.50) will start in the series finale for Miami.
Cabrera received his fifth straight no-decision on Monday despite yielding three runs on five hits and striking out seven in five innings in his team’s 8-7 victory over the Chicago Cubs.
In his lone career encounter against the Angels, Cabrera allowed three runs on four hits in 5 2/3 innings of a no-decision in 2023.
The Marlins evened the series and snapped the Angels’ eight-game winning streak with a 6-2 decision on Saturday.
Miami overcame the early departure of starter Cal Quantrill and benefited from a five-inning effort from reliever Janson Junk, who had his contract selected from Triple-A Jacksonville earlier on Saturday.
“Tonight we had a lot of options to go to,” Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said.
The first surprising option was to pull Quantrill with one out in the fourth inning and runners on the corners. McCullough brought in Ronny Henriquez to face Taylor Ward, who has nine home runs and 27 RBIs since May 6. Also, Ward set a franchise record with his 10th consecutive game with an extra-base hit on Saturday.
Ward hit a sacrifice fly to tie the game before Henriquez struck out Jorge Soler for the third out.
“I just felt like it was time to cut things off there,” McCullough said about the switch from Quantrill to Henriquez.
The Marlins took a 3-1 lead the next half-inning on a double-play grounder by Kyle Stowers and an RBI single by Eric Wagaman.
Junk took the mound in the bottom of the fifth and finished the game by allowing one run and six hits while striking out four to secure the save.
“The way he’s been performing in Triple-A, multiple breaking balls and he was able to expand the zone with it,” McCullough said. “He continued to pound the strike zone, and he’s been throwing a lot of strikes in Triple-A as well.”
Connor Norby added a three-run homer in the seventh inning for the Marlins. The Angels, in turn, were limited to Soler’s RBI single the rest of the way on Saturday.
“We just didn’t muster up any kind of offense tonight to get a threat on,” Angels’ manager Ron Washington said.
Los Angeles starter Jose Soriano allowed three runs on seven hits with three walks in 4 2/3 innings.
“Just out of whack,” Washington said about Soriano. “Just didn’t seem to get comfortable.”
–Field Level Media
