Nolan Schanuel ends homer drought near his hometown, as Angels edge Marlins

MIAMI — Nolan Schanuel was in the perfect place on Friday night.

First, he was able to hit a tie-breaking two-run homer in the ballpark an hour from his hometown, a moment he punctuated with an emotional yell.

Then, he was standing right behind the plate to back up, allowing him the perfect view of left fielder José Siri’s throw and catcher Tyler Heineman’s tag, as the Angels ended their 4-3 victory over the Miami Marlins with an out at the plate.

“Heineman made a great catch and tag and Siri put it right on the money,” Schanuel said. “From my angle, it was pretty much the best angle in the house.”

Angels manager Kurt Suzuki, who was just behind the play in the first base dugout, could suddenly breathe again after the Angels escaped the kind of situation that has tortured them so many times this year. They have lost nine games when leading after eight innings, the most in the majors, but Siri and Heineman made sure it didn’t get to 10.

“It’s awesome,” Suzuki said. “You know they’ve obviously put in a lot of work and guys are getting opportunities, younger guys coming up getting more opportunities in different roles. To have a night like this where guys get thrust into those roles, they succeed and then to get the W was awesome.”

The Angels (45-71) have won back-to-back games for the first time since July 19-21, and they needed contributions from all over the roster to get this one done.

Offensively, Mike Trout got the game going with his 19th homer of the season, and his first since July 8. It was a fitting day to end his drought, because it was Trout’s 35th birthday. He’s now hit six homers on his birthday, equaling the major league record.

“I’ve been jamming myself, so finally good to just stay back on something,” Trout said. “When you go through some things, you create habits that shouldn’t. Just trying to fix that. A little bit better tonight.”

Trout was up again with a chance to tie the score in the seventh, when the Angels got a break. With two outs, he hit a dribbler that went through the legs of pitcher Josh Ekness. Trout hustled to beat the throw at first, allowing the tying run to score on what was ruled an error.

Two pitches later, Schanuel got a sweeper and he lifted it barely over the fence in left-center field. He hadn’t hit a homer since June 23.

“It’s been a while,” Schanuel said. “Kind of thought I had one on my first at-bat (a fly out to the warning track), and fell a little short, so I was kind of upset about it. But just stayed locked in. To be able to hit it in front of my friends and family in pretty much my hometown, my home state, it was awesome. So I showed a little emotion around the bases and threw up a little love you to my little section. It was pretty awesome.”

After Schanuel’s homer, relievers Blake Weiman (in his major league debut), Ben Joyce and José Fermin worked the final three innings. Fermin took the mound in the ninth with a two-run lead and barely held it.

He gave up an infield hit. Two outs later, he allowed a run-scoring single to cut the lead in half. Then Javier Sanoja pulled a line dive just over leaping third baseman Denzer Guzman. Siri was playing deep in left, so Leo Jimenez was waved around to try to score from first on the play. Siri’s throw was perfect.

Umpires reviewed the call, confirming it after a few minutes.

It was the end of a game that began with an encouraging start from George Klassen, who made his return to the major leagues four months after his rocky two-start cameo in April. He didn’t make it out of the third inning in either start, and he walked 10 of the 32 batters he faced.

Since then he had been on a roll at Triple-A, with a 2.57 ERA in his last 12 starts. That included a stretch of 65 hitters without a walk over his previous three outings.

Against the Marlins, he gave up one run in four innings.

“A whole lot better,” he said. “Definitely a big step in the right direction tonight. Still a couple things you need to work on, but a lot more positives to take away from it.”

Although the Marlins had runners in all four innings, Klassen made the big pitches he needed to escape significant damage.

He was having no trouble until the fourth, when the Marlins loaded the bases on two walks and a bunt single. Klassen then walked leadoff hitter Kyle Stowers to force in a run. He then got All-Star Otto López on a comebacker to escape the inning with his 83rd pitch.

“A lot of work happened back in Salt Lake, just trying to not let things spiral out of control,” Klassen said. “Tonight was definitely a big test of that. A lot of positives tonight and just keep on going forward.”

The Marlins took the lead in the sixth, thanks to a pair of bloop singles into center around a walk. On the first one, Trout got a bad jump, then dove and had the ball just drop out of his glove. The Angels still could have had an out on the play because Jakob Marsee went hard toward second before slamming on the brakes. The Angels would have nailed him on his way back to first, but Schanuel didn’t hold on to the ball.

He got a chance to make up for it an inning later.