ANAHEIM, Calif._Mike Trout leaned forward and extended his hands, stretching to get the barrel of his bat to the far side of the plate. Chicago White Sox starter Reynaldo Lopez had put his changeup where he wanted, burying it low and on the outside corner. Trout launched the ball onto the left-center field rockpile anyway.
"I like it down," Trout said with a devious grin. "I think everybody knows that."
In what is shaping up to be a career power year for the two-time MVP _ his third-inning home run gave him 40 for the season, one shy of his career high _ no pitch near the plate seems like too much to handle, or too well-thrown to crush.
Trout was locked in again Friday in the Angels' 8-7 home win against the Chicago White Sox. He scored the opening run after singling in the first. He golfed an inside fastball into shallow center during a three-run fifth. He sparked another three-run rally in the sixth by smoking a single into left. He walked in the eighth to finish the night four for four.
"He was all right," Ausmus joked. "I thought the home run was impressive because he was fooled on it, he was out in front and he was still able to golf it over the center-field wall."
After entering the game in a season-long four-game hitless streak, Trout pushed his average up to .298 _ still seven points below his career average.
"The last couple days or a week I've been battling," Trout said. "I'm getting good pitches to hit and just fouling them off. I felt a lot better today."
Trout reached the 40-home-run plateau in a franchise-record 123 games, 13 games faster than Troy Glaus in 2000 and more than a month earlier than his only other 40-homer season in 2015. He upped his league-leading slugging percentage (.665) and on-base-plus slugging percentage (1.121). He tied Cody Bellinger, who also went deep Friday night, for the MLB lead in long balls.
"Coming into the season, telling myself I'd hit 40 (home runs), I'd be really happy with that," Trout said. "I just got to keep it going, try to finish strong and see where it goes."
The rest of the lineup followed his lead. Justin Upton barely cleared the wall in left center with a three-run laser in the sixth. David Fletcher plated a pair with a bases-loaded single in the fifth. Shohei Ohtani tacked on two hits.
Starter Andrew Heaney gave up two home runs but was otherwise sharp, limiting the White Sox to three runs and four hits across seven innings in his longest start this season.
The Angels' bullpen put an 8-3 lead in peril in the ninth. Trevor Cahill allowed two runs, closer Hansel Robles surrendered a two-run homer to Welington Castillo that made it 8-7, and the White Sox had the tying run in scoring position with two outs. Robles finally ended it, fanning Ryan Goins to keep Trout's big night from going to waste.
