Mental toughness is just as

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Aaron Sanchez will likely have friends and family in the stands when the Toronto Blue Jays open a four-game series at the Los Angeles Angels on Thursday night.

Sanchez will also have plenty of motivation to keep the Blue Jays rolling.

A right-hander who grew up in a desert community halfway between Los Angeles and Las Vegas , Sanchez is scheduled to make his first major league start at Angel Stadium in the series opener.

Sanchez (3-5, 4.35 ERA) was a supplemental first-round draft pick of the Blue Jays out of Barstow (Calif.) High School in 2010. The Angels had three picks before Sanchez was chosen, and the organization had twice drafted Sanchez’s stepfather, Mike Shipley, in the 1970s, but they opted to take infielder Kaleb Cowart with the 18th overall pick, reliever Cam Bedrosian at No. 29 and outfielder Chevy Clarke at No. 30.

Four picks later, the Blue Jays nabbed Sanchez.

Cowart continues to struggle to break into the majors with the Angels, Bedrosian hasn’t performed up to expectations either, and Clark is currently playing independent ball for the Cleburne Railroaders.

Sanchez, meanwhile, made his major league debut in July 2014, was chosen to the American League All Star team while going 15-2 in 2016 , and his 3.00 ERA that season led the AL.

Sanchez has faced the Angels (39-35) three times in his career, but his only two starts came in Toronto (34-29). He’s 0-1 overall against Los Angeles with a 2.03 ERA. He threw one inning of scoreless relief at Angel Stadium in 2015.

Sanchez is 1-0 with a 2.95 ERA in three starts this month after going 0-3 with a 5.96 ERA in May.

“It’s been a battle the first couple months, trying to get back into the swing of things,” Sanchez told reporters after his last start, when he allowed three runs and six hits in six innings of a 6-5 win against the Washington Nationals. “As of late, it’s been trending up.”

That can also be said of the Blue Jays, who have won four of five following their 5-4 win against the visiting Atlanta Braves on Wednesday, improving to 28-1 this season when scoring five or more runs.

The Angels had an off day at home on Wednesday after holding on the defeat the Arizona Diamondbacks 5-4 on Tuesday night to earn a split of the two-game series.

They plan to send Tyler Skaggs to the mound for the series opener. Like Sanchez, he’s undefeated this month after going winless in May. Skaggs has won all three starts in June, allowing one earned run in 20 innings for a 0.45 ERA.

He went 0-2 in May with a 4.28 ERA and had a sub-par outing in Toronto on May 23, allowing three runs and six hits in five innings. He avoided taking the loss when the Angels scored four runs in the ninth inning of the 5-4 win.

This might be his best stretch since undergoing Tommy John surgery in August 2014.

“With Tyler, we’ve seen a constant growth in confidence,” Angels manager Mike Scioscia told the Los Angeles Times. “This guy’s worked so hard to get back to where he was and even a little above that now.”

Skaggs (6-4 , 2.81) is 2-2 overall in his six-year career against the Blue Jays with a 4.11 ERA.

Red-hot Mike Trout will appear in his 1,000th career game for Los Angeles. He is 16-for-23 with four homers and nine RBIs during an eight-game hitting streak.

HOUSTON — Any lauding of the Houston Rockets‘ resilience in Game 4 on Tuesday at Oracle Arena begins with an acknowledgment of their defense, with cliched adjectives serving the general purpose of explaining how they overcame a double-digit, fourth-quarter deficit to claim victory and square the Western Conference Finals before the series relocated back to Toyota Center.

But for a series rife with adjustments, the truth of how Houston salvaged its championship aspirations lies within the minutiae. Methodically and stubbornly, the Rockets have invited the Warriors to play their brand of isolation basketball, influencing Golden State for long enough stretches to temporarily secure advantages with a style of play that blatantly benefits Houston.

The fourth quarter of Game 4 offered a prime example. The Warriors claimed their largest lead of the contest at 82-70 when Stephen Curry assisted on a Shaun Livingston dunk at the 10:45 mark. That play produced the 14th and final assist of the evening for Golden State.

“We scored 12 points,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said of the fourth period. “So it’s not like we were getting great shots either.

“It was sort of trench warfare. It was just everybody grinding it out, a lot of isolation. I guess this is the modern NBA. But the only way you can do this and win is you have to have great one-on-one players. You’ve got to have great defenders, two-way guys, and we do and they do. And so, it just becomes a one-on-one battle with all the switching, and they did a great job of it.”

The Warriors paced the NBA in assist percentage (68.5) during the regular season. The Rockets , conversely, ranked 22nd at 55.7 percent, relying on the isolation brilliance of James Harden and Chris Paul. And while Golden State features two exceptional one-on-one talents in Kevin Durant and Curry, isolation basketball doesn’t reflect the Warriors’ offensive identity.

The Warriors’ 14 assists in Game 4 represented a series low. Their 48.2 assist rate in the series is worse than the Rockets’ assist percentage (49.3), a remarkable and surprising development. The final period on Tuesday revealed Golden State at its most unrecognizable and disjointed.

“I think we just got a little rushed,” Curry said. “I think some of the mix-ups we had on defense affected our energy on the offensive end. And credit to them: We know they’re doing a lot of switching and trying to force us into one-on-one-type situations, but that’s no excuse to not get the ball moving, trusting what we do best. And whether it’s the first quarter, second quarter, or crunch time in the fourth, we got to be us. And that’s going to be the adjustment for Game 5.”

With Game 5 set for Toyota Center on Thursday, the Rockets have a clear understanding of their most immediate mission. Their season-long defensive might has served them well during crucial spans against the Warriors, with Houston scrambling and contesting at a fevered pitch.

The moments when the Warriors get rolling offensively have been harrowing for Houston , yet the Rockets mustered the gumption in Games 2 and 4 to claw back into contention behind their defense. When Golden State threatened to run off to a 3-1 series lead, Houston was unbowed.

“These are the moments that we spend all that time for,” Paul said. “Mental toughness is just as important as physical toughness, and I think guys on our team showed that.”

That level of perseverance wasn’t attached to the Rockets’ collective identity or aligned to Harden individually. But in Game 4, Houston finally won at Oracle Arena and snapped the Warriors’ 16-game home postseason winning streak. After falling to the Warriors in five games in consecutive postseasons, the Rockets have finally cleared one hurdle. Another one awaits.

“We came a long way,” Harden said. “Obviously new personnel but we came an extremely long way, and we’ve been talking about it all season long (starting in the) summertime: put ourselves in the best position, and we’re doing that. And so, another opportunity Game 5, we’ve got to come out and take advantage of it. Simple.”