Angels fall to Tigers as losing streak extends to six

DETROIT —  Riley Greene and Kerry Carpenter homered in a three-run sixth inning and the Detroit Tigers extended their winning streak to five games with a 6-2 victory over the Angels on Tuesday night.

The Angels, last place in the American League West at 54-78, have lost six straight and 12 of their last 14 games.

The start of the game was delayed 2 hours, 45 minutes by heavy storms and the first pitch wasn’t thrown until 9:45 p.m. But the Tigers didn’t have any trouble with the late start.

“This was late, but we wanted to get it in so we didn’t have to play two tomorrow,” Greene said. “I have a lot of caffeine in the body right now.”

Brant Hurter (2-1) picked up his second major-league win in his first start, giving up two runs and four hits in five innings. Jason Foley got the final out for his 18th save.

Johnny Cueto (0-2) took the loss in his second start of the season. The 38-year-old right-hander gave up six runs and six hits — including three homers — in five-plus innings.

The Angels took a 1-0 lead in the first. Taylor Ward opened the game with a double, took third on a fly ball and scored on Nolan Schanuel‘s infield single.

Cueto retired the first nine hitters before Parker Meadows hit a deep fly to left-center field that dropped between Ward and Kevin Pillar for a triple. Matt Vierling doubled with one out, tying the score, and took third on Jo Adell’s error.

“The triple didn’t even get to the warning track — that’s just a miscommunication on our part,” Angels manager Ron Washington said. “You have to make those plays, especially when you have the lead.”

Carpenter took advantage of another defensive mistake as his bouncer went past Zach Neto for an RBI single, making it 2-1 Tigers.

Adell tripled in the fifth and scored the tying run on Ward’s sacrifice fly. But, Jake Rogers homered to center in the bottom of the inning. Greene made it 4-2 with a long homer, his 19th, to center in the sixth, and Carpenter added his 13th homer of the season, a two-run shot, later in the inning.

“[Cueto] is a great pitcher and he got us early, but we knew we would get something to hit,” Rogers said.

“I thought Johnny did a pretty good job of controlling them into the fifth, but it got away from him a little,” Washington said. “But Rogers hit a bomb, he left a sinker up to Greene and then Carpenter got him.”

The Angels put left-hander Matt Moore on the 15-day injured list with a left forearm strain and selected the contract of right-hander Ryan Miller from triple-A Salt Lake City. To make room for Miller on the 40-man roster, the Angels moved Mike Trout to the 60-day injured list.