ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. _ Before Matt Shoemaker took the mound on Tuesday night at Tropicana Field, Mike Scioscia foreshadowed what was to come.
"He's closer to being where he was last year than he ever was," the Angels manager said.
Shoemaker then delivered on the promise, dominating for most of his 61/3-inning outing in the Angels' 4-0 victory over the Tampa Bay Rays.
The Angels (25-23) have won eight of their last 11 games, as they continue to persevere in the face of injuries and slumps throughout the roster.
Just about everyone on the team _ even Mike Trout, who missed time with a sore hamstring _ has endured one or the other.
For Shoemaker, it was a nasty slump that marred much of his April, leaving he and the Angels to wonder when, or if, he'd have a similar reversal to last season. In 2016, he got out of the gate slowly and then started dominating from May through the summer.
He now seems to be fully reversed and cruising in the right direction.
Shoemaker has allowed three earned runs in his last 182/3 innings. On Tuesday, he had allowed just one infield hit _ which could have been ruled an error on third baseman Cliff Pennington _ when he took the mound in the seventh with a two-run lead. He needed only 73 pitches to get through six.
One out into the inning, he had allowed a double, a walk and a single off the top of the right-field wall, loading the bases.
Scioscia then turned to Yusmeiro Petit, who has quietly been one of their most consistent, versatile and valuable relievers. Petit struck out Steven Souza Jr. and Derek Norris to escape the seventh.
Petit then struck out the first hitter of the eighth before yielding to lefty Jose Alvarez, who struck out the next two.
By the time Alvarez had entered, the Angels had doubled the 2-0 lead that they had been sitting on since the second batter of the game.
Cameron Maybin led off the game with a homer, his second in as many games. Maybin is now hitting .483 (14 for 29) since he moved to the leadoff spot last week.
On the next pitch from Alex Cobb, Trout blasted a homer to straightaway left. Trout's last nine homers have all been measured at 400 feet or longer.
The Angels got two insurance runs in the eighth, including Albert Pujols' first hit since he missed the weekend with a tight hamstring and also the second hit of the game for Luis Valbuena. Valbuena had two hits, snapping a hitless streak that reached 25 at-bats.
