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Iannetta's 12th-inning blast sends Angels past A's

Apr 17, 2014 - 7:02 AM Anaheim, CA (SportsNetwork.com) - Chris Iannetta capped a nail-biter of a series between AL West rivals Wednesday with a solo home run to center field in the 12th inning, lifting the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim to an entertaining 5-4 victory over the Oakland Athletics.

The Angels forced extra innings with a ninth-inning rally for the second straight night, but this time they came away victorious, as Iannetta's blast off Drew Pomeranz (1-1) was just out of reach of a leaping Craig Gentry.

"I was looking for a pitch to hit and it was a fastball over the plate," said Iannetta. "I knew I hit it well but Angels Stadium at night, you never know. It's an awesome feeling."

Each of the three games in this set were decided in a team's final at-bat, with Oakland pulling off wins in the first two meetings to improve to 7-1 on their nine-game roadtrip.

"We battled hard again," said A's manager Bob Melvin. "We had chances but we're not going to win them all. Our road trip was 7-2. We had a chance to win it tonight but we didn't."

They were an inning away from sweeping the series, but Luke Gregerson squandered a 4-3 lead in the ninth.

Mike Trout, whose ninth-inning homer sent Tuesday's game to extras, singled with one away and hustled to third when Albert Pujols sent one of his three base hits to center.

Howie Kendrick followed with a slow roller to third and avoided getting doubled-up as Trout crossed with the tying run. Josh Donaldson made a nice backhanded stop on a ball hit by David Freese to strand Kendrick on second.

Oakland left a runner in scoring position in all three innings past the ninth, with Yoenis Cespedes grounding out against Joe Smith (1-0) to strand Jed Lowrie on second in the top of the 12th.

Brandon Moss smacked a three-run homer for the A's, whose starter, Tommy Milone, allowed three runs -- two earned -- on six hits and two walks over six-plus innings of work.

Trout knocked in LA's first run in the third inning with a double into the left-field corner that brought in Erick Aybar all the way from first.

The A's did all their damage off LA starter Tyler Skaggs the next half-inning.

With runners on the corners and one out, Alberto Callaspo laced a double to left field to plate Donaldson. After Nick Punto flew out, Skaggs caught too much of the plate with a fastball that Moss turned on and lined into the first row of the right-field seats for his second home run of the year.

Skaggs worked around baserunners most of the night, allowing a total of seven hits and three walks over his six innings on the hill.

Milone was more stingy but was pulled in the seventh when the first two hitters reached base. Dan Otero came on in relief and induced a pair of ground balls, but Callaspo's throwing error when trying to turn two allowed Iannetta to score.

After Trout went down swinging, Pujols lined an RBI base hit to center to make it a one-run game, and Moss kept it that way with a leaping, run-saving catch at the warning track on a ball hit by Kendrick.

Game Notes

Oakland fell to 3-1 in extra innings, while the Angels improved to 2-2 ... This is the first time the Angels have played four extra-inning games in a homestand since June 1975 ... LA went 1-for-13 with runners in scoring position and left 12 on base ... Oakland has won 15 of the previous 21 meetings at Angel Stadium.






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