ANAHEIM — The Angels aspire to one day be what the Dodgers have been.
In the meantime, they are doing the best they can to knock the Dodgers from their perch.
Logan O’Hoppe’s two-run single with two outs in the eighth inning capped a comeback from an early three-run deficit as the Angels beat the Dodgers, 6-5, before an Angel Stadium sellout crowd of 44,893 on Wednesday night.
The Angels (59-62) swept the Dodgers for the second time this season, and this time they knocked them out of first place in the National League West for the first time since April 27. They had a nine-game lead on July 3.
“Where we’re at, we put ourselves in this spot,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “But, no, I wouldn’t have expected us to be in second place right now.”
Losers of four straight games, the Dodgers (68-53) are now one game behind the streaking San Diego Padres (69-52), who are coming to Dodger Stadium for three games this weekend, the first of six meetings in a 10-day span.
The Angels set a new franchise Freeway Series record by winning seven straight games against the Dodgers.
Former Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen closed it out, pitching on a third straight day. He then said that the Angels shouldn’t merely consider themselves spoilers. They should remember that their playoff hopes are not dead. The Angels are five games out of the third American League wild card spot.
“We never quit,” Jansen said. “We stayed in the moment. We stayed in the game. We didn’t let stuff rattle us. We stayed locked in. And I feel like if we can get that mentality to bring that mindset every day, this team showed that they can play out and we could be good. It’s amazing … I still believe that everything can happen.”
The Angels spoiled Shohei Ohtani’s first time on the Angel Stadium mound since he called it his home. The Angels scored four runs against Ohtani in 4⅓ innings. He had allowed only five runs in his first eight starts combined.
The Dodgers jumped to a 3-0 lead before Ohtani threw his first pitch, thanks to Will Smith’s two-run homer against Kyle Hendricks in the first inning.
The Angels came back to get within a run in the fifth, and then center fielder Bryce Teodosio preserved the deficit by robbing Andy Pages of a two-run homer in the seventh.
In the eighth, the Angels finally got the lead.
Left-hander Justin Wrobleski started the inning by walking Mike Trout and Taylor Ward. Right-hander Edgardo Henriquez then entered. The Dodgers got an out at third on a sacrifice attempt by Christian Moore.
Jo Adell then reached on infield single when his comebacker hit Henriquez and rolled onto the infield dirt. Luis Rengifo struck out, bringing O’Hoppe to the plate as the final hope of the inning.
O’Hoppe said he actually felt good after a foul ball against Henriquez.
“I felt like after I fouled that heater back, I don’t want to say it clicked again, but I just I got a wave of confidence that I haven’t had in a couple weeks,” O’Hoppe said.
O’Hoppe, who has been slumping for much of the past two months, said he then “blacked out,” which was a good thing. He got a 103 mph fastball and he pounded it back through the middle for a two-run single, giving the Angels their first lead of the night.
“I think in that moment, with what he’s gone through, the criticisms and all that stuff, for him to just have that moment, I think it’s pretty special for him, special for the team,” interim manager Ray Montgomery said. “In that situation for him to come through like that, it’s a huge moment. You just cherish those.”
Jansen then retired the Dodgers in order to end it, ruining a night the Dodgers might have figured would be a comfortable victory with Ohtani on the mound.
Ohtani wasn’t as sharp as he had been, but at least got the best of baseball’s first matchup of three-time league MVPs. Ohtani, the only one of 12 three-time MVPs to be a pitcher, matched up twice against Trout. Ohtani struck out him out looking twice, once on a backdoor sweeper and once on a 101 mph fastball that nipped the corner.
They had famously met in the final of the World Baseball Classic in 2023, but that wasn’t a regular-season game and Ohtani had only won one of his MVPs at that time.
“I felt like I executed really well in the two at-bats against (Trout),” Ohtani said through his interpreter. “Just looking back at my outing today, it’s about execution. When I didn’t execute, they took advantage.”
The Angels got to Ohtani for two runs in the second inning. Ward hit a solo homer, his 29th of the season. Yoán Moncada followed with a double, and he came around to score on two fly balls.
In the fifth, Ohtani gave up consecutive singles to O’Hoppe and Teodosio, and then a two-run double to Zach Neto, cutting the Dodgers’ lead to 5-4.
That was all for Ohtani, who reached a season-high with 80 pitches.
From that point on, the game was about the Dodgers trying to desperately to hold on with their recently beleaguered bullpen against an Angels team seemingly determined to chase them down.
Teodosio’s robbery of a would-be homer by Pages was a key moment, keeping the Dodgers from going up by three runs in the seventh.
“The ball was hit up in the air, and I was just trying to go as hard as I could to it,” Teodosio said. “I was able to kind of see the wall right there, and jumped up and was able to get the glove on it. It fired me up. It’s the kind of stuff I work for every single day, so I was very grateful for that.”
The Angels then missed a chance to tie the game in the seventh, when Teodosio was thrown out trying to steal third. In the eighth, the Dodgers bullpen finally buckled, suffering their fifth loss in the last nine games.
The Dodgers have gone 12-21 since July 3.
“It’s something that we’re not really accustomed to, to be quite honest,” Roberts said. “I just think it’s one of those kind of funks we’re in, where there’s some bad walks in there, maybe some sequencing, things like that. But at the end of the day, we’re just not finishing the games where we have an opportunity or on the offensive side, being able to tack on and give ourselves a little bit more breathing room.”
The Dodgers must now collect themselves, because a critical series against the Padres awaits this weekend.
“I think the thing that I appreciate about this club is there’s no finger pointing,” Roberts said. “There’s accountability, and I think that we do a good job of looking at ourselves and saying, ‘Hey, what can I do better?’ And we can all be better. So it’s not a lack of care, and I talk about preparation all the time, so I know it’s not complacency. Our guys are playing their tails off, and it’s going to turn, but I know (third baseman) Max (Muncy) said it yesterday, I said it before, you can’t feel sorry for yourself. And that’s something that I don’t expect from our guys. We’ve got a big series coming up, and (the Padres) are playing great baseball. It’s going to be crazy at Chavez Ravine and our guys will be ready.”