Nearly two hours after Mike Trout passed Tim Salmon in the annals of franchise history, the Angels' newest potential star outfielder capped off the best game of his young career with a walk-off hit.
Jo Adell, who debuted a month ago after spending most of his short minor league career drawing comparisons to Trout, smacked a ground ball up the first base line in Game 1 of the Angels' doubleheader against the Houston Astros on Saturday evening. As the seventh-inning single rolled toward the right-field corner, Shohei Ohtani scooted home from third base and Justin Upton glided in behind him to seal a 10-9 victory before the Angels swept the doubleheader 7-6 in the nightcap for their fourth straight win.
Beaming, Adell ducked his head and turned back toward acting first base coach Jose Molina, who slung an arm around Adell's shoulders and patted his helmet. A portion of the team joined them in celebration as he descended into the dugout to prepare for the second game of the night.
Adell, 21, has looked increasingly more comfortable in the last week _ mostly in the field.
Adell made his mark on Game 1 long before registering his first late-and-close RBI. His highlight reel for the evening opened with his robbery of Astros leadoff hitter George Springer, who ripped Angels starter Griffin Canning's 0-and-2 fastball 369 feet to right field.
The ball would have easily been a home run if Adell hadn't tracked its path on a diagonal, turned his back to the wall and leaped at the last second to haul it in for an out.
With the Angels trailing by one run in the fourth inning, Adell swung at Astros starter Brandon Bielak's cutter on the outer edge of the strike zone and drove it 405 feet to right field for a homer that tied the score at 4-4.
"When I'm going to right field I know I'm where I need to be and I'm not pulling off the ball," said Adell, who snapped an 0-for-16 skid with his third homer of the season. "That tells me everything I need to know, when I'm going down the right field line and hitting balls in the right center. That's where I want to be."
Before the future of the Angels franchise left an imprint, Trout reminded fans one more time of the club's past.
Not 24 hours after tying Salmon on the Angels home run list, Trout crushed a 93-mph fastball to the opposite field for his 15th homer of the season and the 300th of his career in the third-inning. The two-run blast cut the Astros' lead to 4-3 and secured Trout's position atop the franchise charts, which Salmon had held for nearly 14 years.
"It's time to pass the torch onto somebody in the family _ another fish," Salmon said on the game broadcast, for which he regularly serves as analyst.
After returning his equipment to the home dugout at Angel Stadium, Trout emerged to make eye contact with Salmon, who was on the broadcast level, and mime a hug in his direction.
"It's special," Trout said to Fox Sports West after Game 1. "I know he's up there watching. I saw some highlights from (Friday) night that he was getting nervous. I was sitting on 299. I was definitely thinking about it, I'm not gonna lie."
Trout's historic home run cut through sweltering heat _ the 109-degree temperature at first pitch was the hottest in ballpark history _ at 105 mph before landing several rows deep in the right-field seats. Bielak, a native of New Jersey like Trout, whipped around to follow the trajectory of the 410-foot blast as soon as Trout barreled the pitch.
Trout is on pace to hit at least 10 additional homers this season. He has a chance to catch up to Giancarlo Stanton and move into eighth place on the active player leaderboard. Injury has limited the New York Yankees outfielder to 14 games.
Trout, 29, is the 16th player to reach 300 home runs before turning 30 years old and the 11th fastest to accomplish the feat.
Three takeaways on the Angels
_Angels starter Griffin Canning was grooving in Game 1 until he issued a one-out walk to George Springer in the third inning. Not even a subsequent strikeout put Canning back on course. He issued another free pass, gave up a two-run single to Yuli Gurriel and let the Astros extend their lead to 4-1.
_Two-out trouble also bit Felix Pena, who blew a save in the seventh. Pena retired two batters after giving up two straight hits and allowing the Astros to tie the score 7-7. But by the time he secured the third out, the Astros had scored two more runs. Pena wound up the victor in Game 1, thanks to Justin Upton's third RBI of the night andAdell's first walk-off hit.
_Serving as the home team, the Astros got to the Angels early in Game 2. Springer launched a home run to center field on the second pitch thrown to him by Angels left-hander Dillon Peters _ an 83 mph changeup up-and-away _ for a 1-0 advantage in the first. Josh Reddick extended the Astros' lead with a three-run homer.
