The Angels managed just three hits but left-hander Kenny Rosenberg got his first major league victory as Los Angeles beat the visiting Cleveland Guardians 2–1 on Sunday, September 10, in Anaheim, Calif.
The Angels (67–77) won the series 3–1 despite being without banged-up star Shohei Ohtani for all seven games this week. They started three rookies for the second straight game.
The Guardians (68–76) are now 7 1/2 games behind the division-leading Minnesota Twins, who lost 2–0 to the New York Mets, in the American League Central with just 18 games to play.
The Angels went up 1–0 in the first inning when Randal Grichuk doubled, moved to third on a groundout and scored on Mike Moustakas’ sacrifice fly.
Kole Calhoun – an Angel for the first eight years of his career – tied it for Cleveland in the second with a 426-foot homer to right-center, his fourth of the season and seventh against the Angels since leaving the team as a free agent in 2019.
Los Angeles went ahead 2–1 in the third when Kyren Paris beat out a single to first, moved to third on two consecutive balks by Cleveland right-hander Tanner Bibee and came home on Grichuk’s RBI grounder.
Rosenberg (1–1), making just his third major league start, tossed five innings of one-run ball, giving up six hits and a walk with four strikeouts.
Bibee (10–4) took a hard-luck loss, allowing just two hits and two runs in seven innings with eight strikeouts and no walks, retiring the last 14 Angels he faced. But the third-inning balks proved to be decisive.
The Angels got three scoreless innings of relief from Andrew Wantz, Ben Joyce and Jimmy Herget before Carlos Estevez notched his 30th save with a 1-2-3 ninth.
The Guardians got two hits apiece from Calhoun, Jose Ramirez and Andres Gimenez but couldn’t cash in enough of their runners.
The Angels fly to Seattle for a three-game series starting Monday against the Mariners, while the Guardians head north to San Francisco for three with the Giants.
