AL-best Rays go on the road to face AL-worst Angels

After squeaking out a series win over the Houston Astros with a 3-2 victory in 10 innings on Wednesday, the Los Angeles Angels will attempt to do something that hasn't been done in over a year: back-to-back home series wins.

It won't be easy.

The Angels, who have the worst record in the American League, open a three-game set with AL East-leading Tampa Bay on Friday night in Anaheim, Calif.

The last time Los Angeles won back-to-back home series was June 5-11, 2025, against Seattle and the Athletics.

Left-hander Shane McClanahan (6-3, 2.85 ERA), who is 2-0 with a 1.29 ERA in five career starts against Los Angeles, will start the opener and will be opposed by left-hander Sam Aldegheri (1-1, 2.25 ERA), who will be making just his seventh career start and second of the season.

The 24-year-old Aldegheri, who has bounced up-and-down with Triple-A Salt Lake this season, will be making his first appearance against Tampa Bay, which comes in off a three-game home sweep of the Boston Red Sox. He earned the chance with an impressive relief appearance on June 2 against the Colorado Rockies when he scattered four hits and two walks over 5 1/3 scoreless innings while striking out five.

"Best I've seen him look," Angels manager Kurt Suzuki said afterward. "He obviously came up a little bit earlier this year, but just the command, I feel like the command with the fastballs, he was attacking. The changeup played off that; cutter; breaking balls. Everything he threw I thought was competitive, and you saw the results."

Tampa Bay figures to present a tougher challenge, however. The Rays lead the American League with a .258 team average while DH Yandy Diaz also leads the AL with a .331 average.

It's the start of a six-game southern California road trip for the Rays, who also will play three games against the two-time defending World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers starting Monday.

McClanahan has already faced the Angels once this season, picking up the win on May 31 in Tampa in a 5-2 victory. He allowed one run on four hits over five innings while striking out three.

This will be McClanahan's third career start at Angel Stadium, where he has yet to pick up a decision despite putting up some impressive numbers. He has thrown a total of 11 scoreless innings, allowing five hits and three walks while striking out 16.

McClanahan will have to be at the top of his game to meet the standard the Rays got from their last starting pitcher in Wednesday's 7-5 victory over the Red Sox. Drew Rasmussen allowed just two hits over seven scoreless innings and struck out a career-high 13 batters while picking up his sixth win. It capped an MLB-leading seventh series sweep this season for Tampa Bay.

"I think today was just a day where stuff and execution matched up really well," Rasmussen said.

Perhaps even more impressive was the fact Rasmussen threw just 97 pitches, 20 of which were whiffs.

"Staying under 100 pitches, I think, is pretty cool for the swing-and-miss that we were able to achieve," he said.

Rasmussen finished just two strikeouts shy of the franchise single-game record of 15 set by James Shields (Oct. 2, 2012) and matched by Chris Archer (June 2, 2015).

--Field Level Media