Nolan Schanuel ends homer drought near his hometown, as Angels edge Marlins

Jeff Fletcher, The Orange County Register on Aug 7, 2026

Published in Baseball

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MIAMI — Nolan Schanuel’s homer drought ended at the perfect time and in the perfect place.

The Angels first baseman hit a tie-breaking two-run homer in the seventh inning of a 4-3 victory over the Miami Marlins on Friday night.

Schanuel, who grew up about an hour north of this ballpark, had not hit a homer since June 23.

The Angels started the scoring in the first, when Mike Trout ended his own homer drought, appropriately on his birthday. Trout, who turned 35, had not homered since July 8. He’s now hit six homers on his birthday, equaling the major league record. He’s hit 19 homers this season.

Trout was up again with a chance to tie the score in the seventh, when the Angels got a break. With two outs, he hit a dribbler that went through the legs of pitcher Josh Ekness. Trout hustled to beat the throw at first, allowing the tying run to score on what was ruled an error.

Two pitches later, Schanuel got a sweeper and he lifted it barely over the fence in left-center field.

After Schanuel’s homer, relievers Blake Weiman, Ben Joyce and José Fermin worked the final three innings, with Fermin allowing a run in the ninth and nearly allowing a second.

Left fielder José Siri threw out Leo Jimenez at the plate to end the game. Jimenez had tried to score from first base on a line drive that barely got over the glove of leaping third baseman Denzer Guzman.

Umpires reviewed the call, ultimately confirming it, as the Angels (45-71) won back-to-back games for the first time since July 19-21.

They finished a game started by George Klassen, who made his return to the major leagues four months after his rocky two-start cameo in April. He didn’t make it out of the third inning in either start, and he walked 10 of the 32 batters he faced.

Since then he’d been on a roll at Triple-A, with a 2.57 ERA in his last 12 starts. That included a 65 hitters without a walk over his previous three outings.

Against the Marlins, he demonstrated that he’s improved but still has work to do.

On a positive note, this time he got through four innings and gave up just one run. Although the Marlins had runners in all four innings, Klassen made the big pitches he needed to escape significant damage.

He was having no trouble until the fourth, when the Marlins loaded the bases on two walks and a bunt single. Klassen then walked leadoff hitter Kyle Stowers to force in a run. He then got All-Star Otto López on a comebacker to escape the inning with his 83rd pitch.

The Marlins took the lead in the sixth, thanks to a pair of bloop singles into center around a walk. On the first one, Trout got a bad jump, then dove and had the ball just drop out of his glove. The Angels still could have had an out on the play because Jakob Marsee went hard toward second before slamming on the brakes. The Angels would have nailed him on his way back to first, but Schanuel didn’t hold on to the ball.

He got a chance to make up for it an inning later.