Will the real Tyler Skaggs please stand up? LA Angels hoping for the best version to emerge

LA Angels starter Tyler Skaggs has outings where he is nearly unhittable. He also has other outings where its hard to believe he is a major league pitcher.

The fact that inconsistency has been so prevalent for LA Angels lefty Tyler Skaggs is maddening to many Angel fans as well as his manager and the Angel front office. Skaggs has tremendous stuff and when he can harness it like in his last start in Toronto, Skaggs is lights out.  Skaggs sits right now at 6-6 with a 4.61 ERA which is a perfect example of these inconsistencies.

If you look at Tyler Skaggs last few outings you will see the inconsistency clearly. His last outing Skaggs went 7.1 innings giving up one run on three hits with six strikeouts.  In his previous start he went five innings giving up three runs and striking out 5.  The start before that he went only four innings giving up six hits, four walks and five runs with four strikeouts.

So as you can see Skaggs has the capability to be a frontline pitcher but he has to harness his talent and bring it out when he is on the mound.  Skaggs has seven starts where he has given up two runs or less and six starts where he has given three or more runs.

More from Halo Hangout

• New York Post columnist has LA Angels bringing veteran starter back to LA
• Dodgers make wild mistake signing failed LA Angels starter
• Why LA Angels’ Qualifying Offer to Raisel Iglesias could become historical
• Both Gold Glove finalists for LA Angels getting snubbed is a complete joke
• Marcus Stroman definitely appears to be interested in the LA Angels

In five full seasons in the majors Skaggs has never had a winning record to end a season.  Part of Skaggs’ problem is not his fault.  He has beset by a slew of injuries throughout his career including having Tommy John surgery in 2014 after tearing his UCL.  Skaggs has only made over 20 starts in one season (2018) because of various injuries.

Last season was probably his best in the bigs as he had 15 starts of more than five innings where he gave up less than three runs. Skaggs had one stretch from June 3rd through June 25th that he had eight straight quality starts. During that stretch Skaggs went 5-2 and was sitting at 8-4 with a 2.62 ERA.

Unfortunately Skaggs got injured, but attempted to pitch through it and was awful for two games in which he pitched 6.2 innings and gave up 17 runs which ballooned Skaggs’ ERA to 3.78 and dropped Skaggs record to 8-6.  He ended up finishing with an 8-10 record and a 4.02 ERA.

However if you take always those two starts Skaggs’ ERA would have been 2.95 and he would have had a record of 8-8.  Skaggs ended up losing his last six decisions.

This is the attitude Skaggs needs to have when he is out on the mound.

https://twitter.com/angelsduo27/status/1141510821505196032?s=21

With that being said, hopes were high for Skaggs coming into 2019 completely healthy and so far he has not been able to get back what he had in the middle of 2018 on a consistent basis.  Hopefully Skaggs’ last start is a sign of things to come for the lefty.

We will have to wait and see if Skaggs can step up and realize his ast potential.