ARLINGTON, Texas — Joe Maddon could sit at his desk after the Angels’ 9-6 victory over the Texas Rangers with the smile of a man whose plan had worked perfectly.

Somehow.

The Angels manager issued the third bases-loaded intentional walk in the majors since World War II. He had also issued the last one, 14 years ago. That one, and the other in 1998, both came in the bottom of the ninth, with a superstar at the plate and the team in the field one out from a victory. In this one, the walk actually extended the Angels’ deficit in the fourth inning.

It was not a move that made sense in any strategic, mathematical or analytical sense.

“Numbers are one thing,” Maddon said. “Human beings are something completely different. For me, the human element right there required what we did. That’s it. It had nothing to do with math. It was just the right thing to do in the moment to minimize their damage, possibly, and also possibly to pump us up a bit.”

Although Maddon’s intentional walk of Corey Seager in the fourth inning put the Angels behind 4-2, and although the Rangers tacked on two more runs in the inning, the Angels responded with five runs in the next half inning, taking a lead they would not relinquish.

Two of the runs came on Shohei Ohtani’s second homer of the game, as he snapped out of a slump through the first seven games of the season.

Right-hander Austin Warren, the pitcher who was on the mound when Maddon trotted out to the center of the diamond and gave his unconventional plan, admitted he was stunned.

“Absolutely,” said Warren, who was pitching in his 19th major league game. “I was surprised. But I’m not going to tell Joe Maddon no. … I trust in Maddon a lot. It worked out, clearly.”

Warren had been summoned into the game just moments earlier, when starter Reid Detmers couldn’t get the second out in the fourth inning before three runs had scored to give the Rangers a 3-2 lead. Warren then walked Marcus Semien to load the bases.

The left-handed-hitting Seager was coming to the plate with the right-handed Mitch Garver and Adolis Garcia next. Maddon, who rarely comes to the mound other than to make a pitching change, came out and told Warren his plan. The other infielders were also on the mound, and Maddon said they all seemed OK with it.

“It was a great moment on the mound,” Maddon said. “It’s one of those Hallmark kind of moments on the mound, right there.”

Although Maddon avoided the damage of Seager hitting a grand slam, the Angels still gave up three runs. Warren did retire the two righties, but Garver hit a sacrifice fly and then Warren balked in a run, making it 6-2.

It was either the seventh or eighth time in major league history that a team has issued an intentional walk with the bases loaded, because of a discrepancy in the records from the first half of the 20th century.

In any case, it had happened only two other times since 1944. In 2008, Maddon walked Rangers’ slugger Josh Hamilton with the bases loaded and the Tampa Bay Rays up by four. Ten years earlier, Arizona Diamondbacks manager Buck Showalter walked San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds with the bases loaded and a two-run lead, also with two outs in the ninth.

Both the Diamondbacks and Rays retired the subsequent hitter to end the game.

This time, Maddon’s intentional walk added a run to his team’s deficit in the fourth inning, and by the time the inning was over the Angels were down by four.

“That’s something that you don’t normally do,” Maddon said. “And I thought just by going out there and doing something like that, the team might respond. Simple as that. I know it’s early in the game, but I thought it could have changed the momentum of the game.”

First baseman Jared Walsh was skeptical about whether the walk had actually added any fire to the Angels, but they nonetheless responded with a big inning. The Angels scored five runs in the top of the fifth, one on a Kurt Suzuki homer, two on Ohtani’s second homer of the game, one on a Walsh single and the go-ahead run on a Brandon Marsh sacrifice fly.

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“I think getting the barrel on the ball fires every hitter in baseball up,” Walsh said. “We swung the bats really well. That huge inning was cool. A lot of damage.”

Walsh added a two-run homer in the seventh to pad the lead to three runs, which was enough for the Angels’ bullpen. The Angels also got a 447-foot homer from Jo Adell in the second inning. The shot into the second deck in left field was the longest of Adell’s nine major league homers.

After Warren was pulled in the fifth, Aaron Loup (six outs), Ryan Tepera (five) and Raisel Iglesias (three) finished off the Rangers without another run scoring.

After Iglesias locked up the save, the music was blaring in a happy clubhouse and the Angels weren’t about to second-guess their manager.

“He’s been in the game forever, so I trust his judgment,” Walsh said. “It was different, but it’s always good when you get a W.”