ANAHEIM, California — Los Angeles Angels manager Mike Scioscia didn’t know anything about Parker Bridwell when the team obtained him in a modest trade with Baltimore in April.
“None of us had ever seen him throw,”‘ Scioscia said, referring to his coaching staff. “But Billy [Eppler, the Angels’ general manager] was excited because he saw a real upside.”
Excited is the right word now that Bridwell has secured a spot in the rotation. He pitched a career-high seven innings Sunday, allowing five hits and two runs as the Angels won the series against the Boston Red Sox with a 3-2 victory.
Bridwell made just his seventh start, and the Angels are 6-1 in those seven games. He’s now 4-1 with a 3.09 ERA, has five quality starts and has allowed three runs or less six times.
“We didn’t have any expectations,” Scioscia said, “He’s learning on the fly and he’s been real good at making adjustments. You couldn’t ask for a better start than the one he gave us today.”
Bridwell was in the Orioles’ system for several years before the trade, making two major league appearances last season, and he looked at it as a fresh start even if he was a total unknown to everyone in Anaheim.
“I came here with a clear mind,” he said. “I thought the trade would be good for my career. It wasn’t hard to change organizations. It’s what you can make of it.”
The Angels rank last in the American League in home runs, but they hit three solo shots against Boston’s Rick Porcello (4-13) — all leadoff home runs, by Andrelton Simmons (11th) in the fourth, Mike Trout (19th) in the sixth and Luis Valbuena (ninth) in the seventh.
Porcello only allowed five hits and a walk in eight innings but took the loss. It was the 11th time in his last 18 starts that his offense has scored two runs or less for him. He has gone six innings or more in all but one of 21 starts.
“During the day, this park plays small,” Red Sox manager John Farrell said regarding the three home runs. “I thought Rick gave us a good eight innings. He did his job.
“We need to get back to using the whole field like we did a few nights ago, and take relentless at-bats. We didn’t have many of those today.”
Bridwell didn’t allow a hit until the fifth, and then allowed three straight, the last an RBI single by Deven Marrero. Hanley Ramirez hit his 16th home run, a solo shot in the sixth. The Red Sox didn’t do anything beyond the fifth and Ramirez’s home run.
Blake Parker, who has not allowed an earned run in 24 career appearances at Angel Stadium, worked a perfect eighth. Bud Norris allowed a leadoff single in the ninth before a strikeout and double play grounder by Xander Bogaerts.
Los Angeles’ bullpen has pitched 12 scoreless innings, with just two hits, one walk and 13 strikeouts.
On Saturday night, the Angels scored four runs in the third inning off Red Sox starter David Price and added three along the way for a 7-3 win, a bold offensive night for a team that averaged just 2.7 runs in their previous 18 games.
That it came against a Cy Young Award winner made it feel a little bigger than it was.
Albert Pujols had three hits and Andrelton Simmons hit his 10th home run of the season and drove in three runs against Price (5-3), who came into the game having allowed just two runs in his previous 23 innings.
Price gave up six runs (five earned), seven hits and walked three in five innings, his worst outing since an early June loss to the Yankees. It was only the second time this season he allowed more than three runs in a game.
Simmons has been the most productive Angels player not named Mike Trout this season, and he was again. His home run capped the four-run third and gave him two more home runs in 2017 than he had in 2015 and 2016 combined.
“I just wanted to keep the inning going,” Simmons said. “I was looking for a pitch up, and it was a better pitch than I expected. I thought it was a double off the bat, but it just kept going.”
Red Sox manager John Farrell said Price’s effort was an anomaly.
“The difference wasn’t his stuff,” Farrell said of Price. “He had a couple of cutters find the big part of the plate. The thing they did well was make him throw a lot of pitches. It really came down to two big swings.”
Angels starter JC Ramirez (9-8), meanwhile, had a rough two innings, allowing four hits and two walks and making an error, then bounced back and retired 12 straight at one point to pick up the win.
Ramirez walked two and gave up an RBI single to Hanley Ramirez in the first and his error led to a two-run second. He let an easy relay from Simmons on a double-play chance tip off his glove, extending the inning for Mookie Betts and Andrew Benintendi to follow with RBI singles. He settled in thereafter.
“The first couple of innings, I couldn’t get any of my breaking balls down,”‘ Ramirez said. “I stuck with my fastball, which I got over and it was a different game.”
It was just the fifth win in 14 games for the Angels, whose 4.06 runs per game rank last in the American League.
NOTES: The Red Sox recalled third baseman Rafael Devers from Triple-A Pawtucket and optioned Kyle Martin and Doug Fister to Pawtucket. Devers has been one of Boston’s top prospects for two years and was hitting .305 with a .373 on-base percentage and .575 slugging for Pawtucket and Double-A Portland with 20 home runs. Devers will report to the Red Sox on Monday in Seattle and will likely make his major league debut Tuesday. … INF Josh Rutledge will start a rehab assignment with Pawtucket this week. … The Red Sox are 5-6 since the All-Star break, and the Angels’ win was just their sixth in their last 15. … Angels DH Albert Pujols, coming off a three-hit night, wasn’t in the lineup … Red Sox 2B Dustin Pedroia also got the day off from the starting lineup. … The Angels start a six-game road trip to Cleveland and Toronto on Tuesday. Boston starts a three-game trip at Seattle on Monday. …On Saturday, Farrell argued a called strike on Dustin Pedroia to end the fifth inning and was ejected by home plate umpire Phil Cuzzi. It was his second ejection of the season.