Tim Lincecum can’t find his command and the Angels fall to the Red Sox, 6-2

Tim Lincecum believes his declined velocity has hampered him this season. Angels Manager Mike Scioscia believes other obstacles have prevented the 32-year-old right-hander from recapturing his long-ago success.

“His stuff,” Scioscia said Friday afternoon, “is definitely good enough to pitch well in the major leagues. Right now, it’s all command-sensitive.”

Wearing atypically long red socks against the Boston Red Sox on Friday night, Lincecum threw eight consecutive balls to begin his eighth start as an Angel. His command only improved marginally thereafter and, as would follow, the Angels suffered a 6-2 defeat at Angel Stadium.

As in his previous starts, there were occasional signs he could do what he used to. But wildness ran the day, as he walked six men in five-plus innings and yielded four runs on five hits.

Lincecum escaped that first inning by striking out Xander Bogaerts with a curveball, getting David Ortiz to fly out to center and forcing Hanley Ramirez to tap back to the mound. He quickly retired the side in the second inning before encountering more trouble in the third when he again walked Mookie Betts and Dustin Pedroia. He picked off Betts, but Pedroia scored when Bogaerts doubled, and Bogaerts scored when Ortiz singled.

Lincecum loaded the bases without one out in the fourth, then started Betts with a 3-0 count. He again escaped without disaster, only one run added to his ledger on a sacrifice fly. In the sixth, he served up a solo home run to Jackie Bradley Jr., and then exited with his team trailing 6-2, his earned-run average still 8.49 on the season and his future still eminently in doubt.

“Who didn’t watch Tim Lincecum?” Bradley Jr. asked reporters after Friday’s game. “I watched him in high school. Amazing talent.”

Once baseball’s best and most well-known pitcher, Lincecum has been one of its worst this season. Scioscia said he will make at least one more start as an Angel. Beyond that, who knows? He has already said he would accept a move to the bullpen if the team opted to demote him.

Most teams interested earlier this year sought him for that role, but Lincecum opted for an opportunity to start.

Through three innings, Lincecum had thrown 22 strikes out of 55 pitches. Baseball-Reference.com has tracked only five instances of a pitcher throwing fewer strikes on that many offerings. He finished his five-plus innings having thrown 43 strikes among his 90 pitches. No major leaguer had recorded fewer strikes on as many pitches since 2009.

“I just keep battling myself out there,” Lincecum said. “If I start battling the hitters, I’ll do a better job.”

“I think it was pretty obvious,” Scioscia said when asked what was wrong with Lincecum. “He just had a lot of problems with his delivery and his release point. He went through some stretches where it looked like his delivery was in sync, and he made some much better pitches. But, all in all, I think some of the same things plagued him.”

Jhoulys Chacin liberated the rest of the Angels’ bullpen by capably handling four innings. All the while, the Angels’ offense could manage little against Boston starter Rick Porcello (14-2), who threw a five-hitter.

Only in the second inning did they score. Albert Pujols led off with a single to center, Daniel Nava followed with a hit in the same direction that Bradley Jr. overran to turn it into a double.

With two runners in scoring position and no out, Andrelton Simmons hit a grounder to short that brought in one run and Carlos Perez laced a two-out single to score the last.

In his walk-free, complete-game effort, Porcello threw only 26 balls.