Shohei Ohtani homers twice and Angels get a walk-off win (updated)

The Orioles offense got going again tonight, early in the game in Anaheim. But would they be able to overcome a special player having a special night in the series opener?

Shohei Ohtani of the Los Angeles Angels began tonight leading the majors with 28 homers and had homered in nine of his last 14 games. Then he hit two more tonight as the Angels overcame an early 6-2 deficit to move ahead 7-6 in the fourth.

The Orioles would tie the score at 7, but the Angels came up with a walk-off win in the bottom of the ninth as Ohtani came up big again.

With one out, Paul Fry came on for Tyler Wells, who got six big outs. Fry walked Ohtani, and one out later he stole second base. It was his 12th stolen base. The Orioles could have pitched around first baseman Jared Walsh, but went after him, and he singled to right to score Ohtani. The throw was a bit late, confirmed by a replay, and the Angels had a walk-off 8-7 win.

With the loss, the Orioles fall to 27-55 and were denied a season-high four-game win streak. It would have been their first four-game win streak since Sept. 4-8, 2020. Los Angeles improved to 40-41 overall and to 12-5 at home in the last 17 games.

The Orioles got a pair of early solo homers and a big swing from Anthony Santander as they scored six runs in the first three innings to take an early 6-2 lead.

Trey Mancini absolutely mashed a ball to deep center for his 15th homer and a 1-0 lead in the top of the first. Mancini hit a 1-1 fastball 451 feet for the lead. It was the longest O's homer of the year, four feet farther than one that Ryan Mountcastle hit June 6 versus Cleveland. The only homer Mancini ever hit farther was one of 459 feet at Texas in July 2017. Mancini had been 3-for-23 on this road trip with 12 strikeouts before his homer. This was career homer No. 101 for Mancini.

And Domingo Leyba is now just 100 homers behind him after he hit his first major league homer in the second inning. Leyba connected on Griffin Canning's 3-2 curveball. The homer came in his 39th big league game and his 73rd plate appearance in the majors.

Down 2-0, the Angels tied it against O's lefty Keegan Akin in the second when former Oriole José Iglesias hit a two-run homer on a down-and-in slider that was not even a strike. But his seventh homer, which came on an 0-2 count, tied it up.

The tie didn't last long.

The Orioles scored four runs in the top of the third to knock Canning from the game. The earlier homers came with two outs and none on, and so did this rally.

Left fielder Austin Hays and Mancini singled, and a walk to Mountcastle loaded the bases. Then Santander drilled a first-pitch fastball into the right-field corner for a three-run double. He hit the ball 107 mph off the bat. When Pedro Severino's 109 mph double brought Santander home, the O's lead had grown to 6-2.

They went 6-for-14 off Canning, who pitched just 2 2/3 innings while giving up two doubles and two home runs.

But Ohtani led off the third with a solo homer, No. 29. Later in that inning, Max Stassi's RBI single brought Los Angeles within 6-4. An inning later they took the lead. After David Fletcher's RBI single pulled the Angels within a run, Ohtani thrilled the home crowd with two-run homer to left off Akin for the 7-6 lead. He hit No. 30 a distance of 400 feet to left with a 111 mph exit velocity.

That gave Ohtani 13 homers over his last 16 games. This was his sixth career multi-homer game.

Ohtani is the first player in American League history to reach 30 homers and 10 stolen bases in his team's first 81 games of the season. The only National League players to have done it are Sammy Sosa (1998) and Albert Pujols (2009).

So the Orioles fell behind, but a few innings later they would tie it at 7-7. In the sixth, Cedric Mullins reached on a fielder's choice grounder and advanced to second on a balk by Steve Cishek. When Hays doubled, Mullins scored and the game was all square.

Akin lasted just three innings, allowing seven hits and four runs, including two homers, as his struggles continued. His ERA increased to 7.46 during a 64-pitch outing.

Over his past four games, Akin has allowed 23 earned runs and six homers over 17 innings for an ERA of 12.18.

O's right-hander Spenser Watkins made his major league debut in the Angels fifth and got the last out, becoming the 11th O's player to debut this year. He got the first two outs of the sixth before manager Brandon Hyde called for Tanner Scott to face Ohtani. Scott threw him five sliders, and on the fifth he grounded out to second base.

Hyde on Ohtani: "He pretty much single-handedly beat us. So, he's such a good player. I don't know what to say. He's the hottest hitter on the planet right now, and it's not just driving the ball, base hits. It's deep home runs. You walk him, he's going to steal second on you. You know, it's plus-plus speed. Plus-plus power. He's locked in. It's extremely challenging to face him and yeah, I mean, he's one of the best players on the planet."

Hyde on Wells' good outing and Akin's continued struggles: "Once again, (Wells) comes in, he's throwing strikes. Attacks hitters. Just does a great job. No walks, not deep counts. He just goes right after guys with good stuff and he has no fear. Not an easy environment to pitch in late in the game. I sent him back out to get (David) Fletcher out in the ninth inning. He does that easily and pitches two huge innings for us. Once again, a great job. Fun development story right now. Fun to watch him continue to improve.

"Akin struggled. Tough time putting hitters away. Lot of good swings off him. We had a lead, he had a tough time keeping us there. The off-speed stuff is extremely inconsistent and they were taking good swings off him for three innings."

Akin on overcoming spring training struggles, and whether that experience could that help him now: "It was a different kind of struggling there, in my opinion. That was just, you know, not throwing strikes, walking guys. I feel like I don't have that problem yet, and hopefully it doesn't ever happen again. Right now, I feel like I'm throwing too good of strikes, or too good of pitches in counts where I shouldn't be. So just got to look at it that way and move on with it and work on that in between outings."