Angels Pitcher Believes He Was Tipping Pitches in Worst Start of Season

Los Angeles Angels veteran pitcher Kyle Hendricks is not used to many walks when he is on the mound.

As the Halos' lost to the Minnesota Twins, 11-4, Friday night, the veteran right-hander threw the most walks in a single outing in his 12-year career with five. Hendricks has never thrown over 44 walks by the end of a season, including years where he has hit 199 innings total.

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After he mustered just three innings, his least amount of time on the mound in an Angels uniform, Hendricks theorized that he may have been tipping pitchers to Minnesota batters.

“I feel the misses were right there,” Hendricks said. “They were just spitting on really good pitches. So I don’t know if I’m just telegraphing stuff. They kind of knew what’s coming type of thing. We’ve just got to dig in and find something. Because it really wasn’t as bad as I thought.”

Hendrick's final line in the loss was three strikeouts, seven earned runs, the five aforementioned walks, and hit two batters over his 90 pitches.

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“Very uncharacteristic,” Hendricks said. “I don’t know. Just a little bit lost. Got to go back and look at it. They were just kind of on everything.”

There was an interesting wrinkle for this particular game as first pitch came around 10 hours and 10 minutes after a game they played the night prior in Anaheim.

Players spoke out about their desire to have played a day game knowing they would travel to Minnesota that night, but after the home loss, the team got on a plane and arrived to Minnesota around 5 am local time.

To make matters about a half an hour worse, the Twins rescheduled this particular game 30 minutes earlier than planned due to a Los Angeles Lakers versus Minnesota Timberwolves playoff game happening right across the street.

Hendricks, however, noted that the travel time had no impact on his performance and refused to use it as an excuse.

“No way,” Hendricks said. “No way.”

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