LA Angels' gutsy pitching is keeping the team's winning streak alive

The LA Angels are on a season-high six game winning streak, meaning the entire locker room is playing well. The offense finally learning how to draw walks is leading to scoring flurries. However, lost in the excitement of sweeping the Dodgers and a born-again offense has been a pitching staff that, despite its flaws and injuries, has shown up at the most crucial of times.

Monday night was not the best start of José Soriano's young career. It was a quality start, as he allowed three earned runs over six innings. That solid, but not outstanding, statline does not tell the entire story though. Soriano did not have his typical stuff Monday night. He issued four walks and hit a batter, gettin himself into trouble multiple times throughout the game.

But he survived, and the Angels stayed alive with him.

LA Angels' gutsy pitching is keeping the team's winning streak alive

After the offense gave him a one-run lead in the first inning, Soriano loaded the bases before recording a single out. It seemed like a blowup start was incoming, but Soriano limited the damage to only two runs, finding his groove to earn a double play and another ground out to escape the first.

After loading the bases again in the third inning, Soriano struck out back-to-back A's to hold a newly established 4-2 lead. With the lead at risk again in the bottom of the sixth, Soriano ended his start by inducing two easy outs to strand the potential game-tying and game-winning runs on first and second.

Great starters do not always have their best stuff when taking the mound. But they find a way. And Soriano most definitely did not have his best stuff on Monday night, but he navigated the Athletics' lineup just enough to keep his team alive, which is what turns a good starter great.

It is hard to mention the word gutsy without bringing up Kenley Jansen. After shutting down his former team on Friday and Saturday, Jansen once again took the mound on Monday and Tuesday. Anytime the Angels held the lead on Tuesday, eyes instantly went to the bullpen to see how Ron Washington would navigate a potential save situation. Eventually, it came down to Jansen taking the mound in ninth with a three-run lead.

And while he did allow a run, Jansen earned his tenth save of the season, finishing the game with a 93-mph sinker right down the middle of the plate that Tyler Soderstrom did not even swing at. Outside of the disaster of an outing against the Detroit Tigers, Jansen holds a 1.84 ERA and has largely been the elite closer the Angels were hoping for.

The most important player in getting the lead to Jansen was Kyle Hendricks, who had a similar outing to Soriano. It was looking to be one of the veteran's more forgettable starts as a Halo, as he allowed four runs in the first four innings. But once Yoan Moncada (who is turning into one of the best hitters for the Angels) hit his mammoth home run tie things up, Hendricks delived each pitch with meaning and gave a depleted Angels' bullpen a lead to maintain over 3.1 innings rather than the 5+ inning workload that they seemed destined for early.

The Angels team-wide pitching stats rank them bottom five in the league (per FanGraphs). And they surely have not been perfect during this winning streak. Nevertheless, when the pressure rises on them - whether in the first inning or the ninth - they rise to the occasion and keep this Angels squad humming as they maintain pace as Mike Trout nears his return.

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