PITTSBURGH – Rookie right-hander Walbert Ureña continued to pitch well in his run against some of the game’s best pitchers, but the Angels’ offense couldn’t get going against Paul Skenes or the Pittsburgh Pirates’ bullpen and ended up dropping the series’ rubber match Sunday at PNC Park, 1-0.
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Ureña emerged victorious in games against Jacob Misiorowski and the Brewers and Jacob deGrom and the Rangers in August, and he kicked off his September with his longest start as a Major Leaguer. He pitched into the eighth inning for the first time in his Major League career, scattering three hits and a walk over his eight innings, striking out four.
That eight inning outing was tied for the longest for an Angel starter this year, matched twice by Reid Detmers (Aug. 15 and May 24) and José Soriano (April 6).
Ureña didn’t miss many bats, getting only six whiffs, but the hard contact he allowed was mostly on the ground, using a sinker and changeup heavy pitch mix to induce 16 ground balls.
His lone blemish was a solo shot to left by Pirate catcher Henry Davis in the third.
Regardless of his opponent, Ureña has been on a tear of late, pitching to a 2.26 ERA over his last 11 starts (15 earned runs allowed over 59 ⅔ innings pitched). He has posted a 4-4 record in that stretch.
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Skenes, a product of El Toro High School in Lake Forest, pitched well in his first outing against his favorite team growing up. The Angels were pesky to retire – 43 of his 87 pitches thrown were with two strikes and he only fanned two hitters on the day – but they couldn’t square him up, amassing just five base runners on four hits and a walk.
They did come close to getting on the board when Mike Trout doubled to center with two outs in the fifth, but Zach Neto was thrown out at the plate handily on a relay from Oneil Cruz to Brandon Lowe to Davis.
The Pirates turned to Gregory Soto, Carmen Mlodzinski and Camilo Doval to bridge the gap to closer Mason Montgomery, who worked around a two-out walk by pinch-hitter Kyren Paris to pick up his 10th save of the season.
The Angels ended up dropping two of three in Pittsburgh this weekend despite allowing just one run in each game.
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More to come on this story.