{"id":104682,"date":"2025-12-22T08:37:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T08:37:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/104682\/"},"modified":"2025-12-22T08:37:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T08:37:13","slug":"angels-best-single-game-performance-came-from-this-starting-pitcher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/104682\/","title":{"rendered":"Angels Best Single-Game Performance Came From This Starting Pitcher"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Los Angeles Angels had some memorable single-game performances in 2025, and while many weren\u2019t positive, most Angels fans would say the best ones came from the power hitters. DH Mike Trout did notch his 400th home run, after all, and outfielder Jo Adell flirted with a 40-homer year into the last week of the season.<\/p>\n

But Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com<\/a> came up with a different choice for best single-game performance, and his choice will surprise many fans. The website chose a best performance for every team in baseball, and their selection was a June 25 start by pitcher Yusei Kikuchi against the Boston Red Sox at Angel Stadium.<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s hard to argue with the numbers he posted that day. Kikuchi struck out 12 and allowed no earned runs over seven innings as the Angels won, 5-2. The 12 strikeouts tied Kikuchi\u2019s second-best strikeout mark of his career, and he produced 20 swings and misses while throwing 105 pitches.<\/p>\n

That game mattered, too. It\u2019s easy to forget now, but the Angels were hovering around the .500 mark <\/a>in late June, and their record at the end of the month was 41-42. They were battling the Texas Rangers for third place in the AL West, and the Seattle Mariners were within range as well.<\/p>\n

Whatever good vibes the Angels had at that point quickly vanished when Ron Washington had to step down due to health problems, and the last two months under interim manager Ray Montgomery ended up being an unfortunate exercise in futility.<\/p>\n

As for Kikuchi, he hasn\u2019t been mentioned much this offseason, but he\u2019s an important part of the rotation for 2026. He\u2019ll be the lone veteran in a young rotation that will feature starters Jose Soriano, newly-acquired Grayson Rodriguez along with converted reliever Reid Detmers.<\/p>\n

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New manager Kurt Suzuki will be looking to Kikuchi for consistency, which will be a big change for Kikuchi, who feuded with Montgomery down the stretch and complained about the Angels\u2019 weight room and facilities.<\/p>\n

Kikuchi could also be a candidate for improvement under new pitching coach Mike Maddux. The Angels have signed multiple pitchers with injury histories that will keep Maddux busy, but the 34-year old Kikuchi made 33 starts in 2025 and pitched 178-1\/3 innings, so he\u2019ll be ready to go with what will likely be a new pitching program.<\/p>\n

His ERA was 3.99, and it\u2019s not unreasonable to expect some improvement there that would make Kikuchi more than just an innings-eater who was elevated to the top of the rotation on a bad team in 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Los Angeles Angels had some memorable single-game performances in 2025, and while many weren\u2019t positive, most Angels…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":104683,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164,24643,36470,14506,10900,2866,23438,5128,14507,48905,56726,58,5224,17203,23643],"class_list":{"0":"post-104682","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-anaheim","8":"tag-anaheim","9":"tag-anaheim-headlines","10":"tag-anaheim-news","11":"tag-boston-red-sox","12":"tag-grayson-rodriguez","13":"tag-jo-adell","14":"tag-kurt-suzuki","15":"tag-los-angeles-angels","16":"tag-mike-maddux","17":"tag-mike-trout","18":"tag-ray-montgomery","19":"tag-reid-detmers","20":"tag-rhett-bollinger","21":"tag-seattle-mariners","22":"tag-texas-rangers","23":"tag-the-angels","24":"tag-yusei-kikuchi"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104682"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104682\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}