Angels rally comes up short in loss to A’s

OAKLAND — Depending on your point of view, the Angels’ promising rally came to an end because of Blake Treinen, Justin Bour or Chris Guccione.

Whether you give credit to the Oakland A’s All-Star closer, blame the Angels hitter or accuse the umpire of making a questionable call, the end result was the same.

The Angels, who had the potential tying run on base in the eighth inning, came up empty and lost 4-2 to the A’s on Saturday night.

“Really I have no one to blame but myself,” Bour said. “I didn’t get it done. You can argue balls and strikes and all that stuff. Really at the end of the day it’s a matter of getting it done, and I haven’t and didn’t there. Was it in the zone? No, but I still didn’t get the job done.”

Bour, who gave credit to Treinen for being “one of the best closers in the game,” stepped to the plate just after the Angels had cut a 4-0 deficit to 4-2, scoring a couple of runs on a Mike Trout sacrifice fly and an Andrelton Simmons RBI single.

The A’s then summoned Treinen to try for a five-out save. Albert Pujols greeted him with a single, which left runners at the corners for Bour.

Bour got ahead 3-and-0, and then Treinen threw three straight pitches outside, a called strike, a foul, and then a third one that Bour took. He started toward first, but Guccione rung him up.

“I just didn’t get it done,” Bour said. “You can argue all you want the 3-2, but I didn’t get it done.”

Manager Brad Ausmus said he wasn’t sure in real time whether the pitch was a strike, but after watching the replay after the game, he felt the called strikes were probably outside.

“For me, they were a little off,” Ausmus said. “It would have been nice to get the calls. But calls go both ways. I thought they were a little off, but that’s part of the game.”

After Bour struck out, Jonathan Lucroy hit a popup to end the inning. The Angels went down in order in the ninth, ending a frustrating night that started off in such promising fashion.

The Angels had four baserunners in the first three innings, seemingly right on A’s lefty Brett Anderson, but they let him wiggle free without any runs.

Angels starter Felix Peña dominated the A’s lineup, retiring the first eight hitters, but it got away from him with two outs in the third.

Peña gave up a bloop single to No. 9 hitter Josh Phegley, and then he gave up a single, hit a batter and gave up a two-run single to Stephen Piscotty.

An inning later, Peña left a fastball over the middle of the plate that Mark Canha blasted for a two-run homer, ending his night.

“He seemed to lose command of his offspeed pitches,” Ausmus said. “The fastball was fine, but it seemed like the breaking ball and changeup, especially the breaking ball, he had trouble with command.”

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