Alex Meyer makes some progress with delivery in Angels’ 8-6 victory over the A’s

Seeking to recapture his old form earlier this month, Alex Meyer resorted to the earliest captures he could find on the Internet: YouTube.

“Yeah, I literally just hopped on YouTube,” he said. “I was talking to one of the trainers and they wanted to see some old footage, so I thought, ‘Let’s see what we can find on there.’”

There, the 26-year-old found his highlights from his junior season at the University of Kentucky, in 2011. He grew an inch each year in college and focused specifically on “staying tall” while on the mound, keeping his arm slot high.

On the video, the Angels’ 6-foot-9 right-hander looked different, and he knows now that his arm slot dropped unintentionally after he returned from two months on the disabled list because of shoulder discomfort in 2013. So he went to work reverting it.

“You can see my arm slot was a little bit higher, my mechanics were a little bit different, my stride wasn’t quite as long,” he said. “It’s going to be hard to get muscle memory without doing it for so long, but it’s just an adjustment that needs to be made and hopefully build consistency and in the long run hopefully keep me healthy and try to not get so sore.”

Meyer made his final start of the season Wednesday night in the Angels’ 8-6 victory over Oakland and yielded two runs on two doubles and a single in the first inning, then then threw three more scoreless innings.

Meyer logged a 4.57 earned-run average in 21 2/3 innings as an Angel, in five abbreviated starts since his Aug. 1 acquisition. He struck out 24 and walked 13, for him an encouraging beginning.

“It’s just a matter of consistency,” he said. “With that, I literally try to watch it before I go to bed at night, to have that in my mind and try to feel that a little bit. … It’s just going to take time. I know it’s not going to happen overnight.”

Said Angels Manager Mike Scioscia: “I think it’s his natural release point. It’s more in line with where he threw the ball in college.”

In the Angels’ half of Wednesday’s frenzied fourth inning, they sent 14 batters to the plate and scored eight runs. There were four doubles, three singles, two walks, and one Kole Calhoun home run. Over their four most recent games, they have scored 17 runs. Somehow, 15 of those have scored in the fourth inning.

The win Wednesday clinched fourth place for the Angels in the American League West, ahead of Oakland. It also carried them to the 10th-worst record in MLB, meaning they’d pick 10th in the 2017 draft. Under the rules of the current Collective Bargaining Agreement, only the top 10 picks are protected when teams sign free agents who’ve received qualifying offers. Colorado, 2 1/2 games behind, is the lone team that could sink below the Angels by Sunday.

Short hops

Mike Trout took a 96-mph fastball from John Axford off his left shoulder blade in the eighth inning. He was immediately removed from the game. Trout said he was exceptionally sore and would undergo tests Thursday and hopes to play Friday. “Three games left,” he said. “I’m going to try to grind it out.” …

Left-hander Tyler Skaggs (flexor-pronator strain) is on track to start either Saturday or Sunday. … Right-hander Jered Weaver might or might not start over the weekend after exiting his Monday night start because of back tightness. If he doesn’t, his Angels career could be over.

Jesse Dougherty contributed to this report.

pedro.moura@latimes.com

Twitter: @pedromoura