Jered Weaver falters in latest Angels loss

The Angels made the worst team in the American League look great again. A poor start from Jered Weaver and insufficient offense led to another loss, this time by a score of 9-4 against the Minnesota Twins at Angel Stadium.

The last-place Twins are 4-0 against the Angels. Against the rest of their schedule, they’ve won 16 of 59 games.

The latest Angels loss, coupled with an Oakland Athletics victory, left the Angels alone in last place in the American League West.

It started badly. Weaver gave up a leadoff single and stolen base to Eduardo Nunez, balked him over to third and yielded a run-scoring single on a fastball to Joe Mauer. Johnny Giavotella then threw away a potential double-play ball in the third.

It could have ended the inning, but instead put runners on the corners with one out. Weaver left a changeup up against Trevor Plouffe, who hit it over the fence for a three-run home run. With runners again on the corners and none out in the fifth, Weaver induced a double play, which scored the fifth run as a byproduct. In the sixth, he served up a home run to Byron Buxton — the major league-leading 18th homer hit against Weaver.

Weaver gave up six runs in six innings.

Al Alburquerque, in his Angels debut, gave up three more in the seventh inning.

Mike Trout, in the lineup as the designated hitter after exiting Sunday’s game because of a bruised right wrist, singled sharply in the first inning but did not reach base thereafter, although he drove a ball 407 feet in the eighth inning. The Angels scored once in the second when Shane Robinson singled to shortstop. Todd Cunningham came home and Gregorio Petit took third when he alertly turned into a Twin when caught in a rundown, causing interference to be called.

Cunningham helped push across the Angels’ next runs in the fourth, doubling against Twins starter Ricky Nolasco amid an abbreviated rally. In the sixth, he walked, putting two men on for Petit, who promptly hit into a double play.

“We tried to put pressure on them offensively,” Angels Manager Mike Scioscia said. “We did, but we just got too far behind to get where we needed to be.”

The Angels put only one more runner on base and their defense worsened.

In the seventh, Petit mishandled two balls for errors and third baseman Yunel Escobar handled another one oddly, eliciting boos from the remaining fans at Angel Stadium.

The Angels said they sold more than 36,000 tickets to the game. There appeared to be fewer than 5,000 fans still sitting in their seats come the ninth inning, when Giavotella excited them with a home run. It was his fourth hit of the night; no other Angel had more than one.

In the ninth, the Angels also debuted Jefry Marte in left field. The power-hitting infielder had been training there for a week. Earlier in the day, Scioscia said that Marte had demonstrated an aptitude for the position. The team is searching for offense from the spot, which has been historically bad for a second consecutive season.

Weaver, his earned-run average at an unsightly 5.71 and his peripheral marks even worse, has been the Angels’ worst starting pitcher.

They will incorporate a new starter, Tim Lincecum, into their rotation this weekend. Someone will need to depart, and another man probably will give way to Nick Tropeano when he returns to the rotation this month. Could it be Weaver? The Angels are not going to relegate Matt Shoemaker to the bullpen or back to the minors, not with how well he has been pitching. Jhoulys Chacin has been OK.

One option would be to demote 2015 All-Star Hector Santiago to the minors. Another would seem to be: put Weaver in the bullpen. Scioscia would not address Weaver’s status in the rotation or the rotation’s future, other than to say that he was excited to put it “in order” this weekend. “That’s what we need,” he said. “I think it’s pretty evident.”

Scioscia insisted he remained confident that the Angels (27-37) would improve. Weaver said the same of himself, although he has not exhibited the velocity gain he predicted at the start of the season.

“Today was promising,” Weaver said. “I’ve just got to keep working hard.”