The Athletics dropped their final game of their mid-week series against the Pirates on Wednesday evening, falling to Pittsburgh 12-4. Nothing went right tonight as the A’s were losing big from the get-go, and never really mounted any sort of comeback attempt. The loss drops them to 36-38 but on the bright side the division-leading Seattle Mariners lost tonight so the A’s remain just a game and a half back of them for the lead in the AL West. New series starts tomorrow!
Things were rough from the jump for the Athletics tonight. Right-hander Aaron Civale was on the mound for the A’s, making his first start since going on the IL a few weeks ago. Though he looked sharp in his lone rehab assignment he did not look like himself tonight. Pittsburgh plated three early runs against the veteran right in the first inning, then added two more in the second. The Pirates were up 5-0 before half of the fans had found their seats.
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Civale bounded around a pair of singles in the third to post a zero for the frame, but a leadoff walk in the fourth ended his day after just 71 pitches, putting the bullpen in charge for a majority of tonight’s innings.
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Aaron Civale: 3 IP, 9 H, 6 ER, 2 BB, 2 K, 71 pitches
Not a great return appearance for Civale, who didn’t look comfortable at all tonight. Maybe the biggest thing is that he made it through tonight without any sort of aggravation of the shoulder injury. He’s lined up to take on the San Francisco Giants next week.
Left-hander Jose Suarez replaced Civale for the frame and allowed a two-run home run to push this game to 7-0 Pirates.
Meanwhile on offense, the A’s bats were struggling against Pittsburgh rookie Braxton Ashcraft. The right-hander held down the offense, issuing just two free passes and one meaningless single through the first five innings.
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By now it felt out of reach but at least the bats kept working. Jacob Wilson smacked a two-run single in the bottom of the sixth to get the A’s on the board, avoiding the shutout:
That was as close as the A’s would get to a comeback tonight. Just a half inning later Pittsburgh got those two runs back and then some, adding on five runs in the top of the seventh to blow this game wide open.
All that was left to do was get through these final few frames. They weren’t totally without entertainment. Rookie center fielder Henry Bolte went yard in the bottom of the seventh for his second career home run and first in Sacramento:
Then, in the final frame, Zack Gelof, who entered tonight on an MLB-leading 20-game hit streak, extended it at the last second with a ninth inning home run for the Athletics’ fourth run of the night:
21 game hit streak now. After that the A’s went down 1-2-3 to finish this game.
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Tough loss. The A’s need to flush this one though and get ready for a big series against a division rival. The A’s welcome the Los Angeles Angels to Sacramento for a four-game series, one that the A’s need to clean up in. It’ll be Gage Jump for the home team, though the Angels have yet to announce their starter for the series opener. Stay tuned…
