A’s fumble early lead after eight walks and two errors, losing 7-2 to Diamondbacks
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- A's surrendered 10 free bases on 8 walks and 2 errors in 7-2 loss Saturday.
- Despite 10 hits and strong showings from Kurtz and Langeliers, A's fell short.
- Pitcher J.T. Ginn walked five and allowed four runs before exiting in fifth.
Coming into Saturday’s matchup with the Arizona Diamondbacks, the Athletics lineup was led by two of the two hottest hitters in all of baseball: rookie sensation first baseman Nick Kurtz and catcher Shea Langeliers.
Kurtz was just over a week removed from one of the best offensive performances in Major League Baseball history where he tied the total-base record with 19 and became the first rookie ever to hit four home runs in a single game.
Langeliers had homered in five of seven games leading up to Saturday’s contest and has an on-base plus slugging percentage over 1.000 since returning in late June from injury.
Both sluggers tallied hits in their first two at-bats, and with each of them crossing the plate on a two-run double by Tyler Soderstrom in the third, the A’s held a 2-1 lead by the start of the fifth inning.
By the seventh inning, however, Kurtz and Langeliers collided and fell to the ground on a routine pop-up in foul territory just one pitch after A’s manager Mark Kotsay was ejected, leading to the home team’s second error of the inning and culminating their late-game collapse, losing 7-2 to Arizona.
“We gave 10 free bases away. We had eight walks total between the pitching staff and those two errors,” Kotsay said. “When you give free bases away, it’s tough to win games.”
Despite outhitting Arizona 10-to-7, the A’s fell to 49-64 on the season — 10.5 games out of a wild card spot — while the sliding Diamondbacks improved to 52-59. Heading into Saturday, the A’s had won seven of their previous eight games.
‘I want to make sure I’m defending my guy’
Kotsay said he was frustrated with the strike zone of home plate umpire John Bacon for most of the game, which led to his second ejection of the season.
His frustration came to a head in the top of the seventh inning during an at-bat by Diamondbacks outfielder Lourdes Gurriel Jr., during which Kotsay was ejected, that had one pitch fully in the strike zone and one borderline pitch both called balls, according to MLB.com’s live gamecast.
“I thought Lang was doing a good job receiving and just not getting calls,” Kotsay said of Langeliers. “We had some borderline pitches went against us. So at that point I want to make sure I’m defending my guy. That’s what I did.”
Despite the ejection, three A’s — outfielder Carlos Cortez, Kurtz and Langeliers — shined at the plate with two hits apiece, while Lawrence Butler singled and lined out sharply to left field.
Langeliers in particular, who is slashing .258/.312/.507 with 19 homers this season, has been crushing the ball as of late, earning praise from his manager. Since June 30, he’s hit nine home runs, seven doubles and posted a 1.022 OPS.
“He’s staying on everything,” Kotsay said. “When he came back initially from the rehab assignment, he was pretty locked in, and then he went through a little bit of a stretch, and I think he’s come out of that stretch and started to swing it out really well. The results are there.”
Walks hurt A’s starter
While A’s starter J.T. Ginn has walked batters well below league average this season (two per nine innings pitched ), he surrendered five free passes on Saturday that ballooned his pitch count and contributed to him surrendering four runs in less than five innings.
By the time he exited the game with one out in the fifth, Ginn had thrown 40 balls out of 85 pitches.
“I just didn’t do a great job of getting ahead early,” Ginn said. “That’s something that I normally do really well, but it’s going to be better next time.”
While Ginn had four starts to begin the year, he held a 5.60 ERA in just 17 ⅔ innings before missing time with right elbow inflammation, taking five starts in Triple-A and coming out of the bullpen throughout parts of June and July.
In his two starts before Saturday since returning to the rotation in late July, though, Ginn had only surrendered one run through 11 innings.
“For J.T. there’s always an emotional component that plays into some of the results when he doesn’t feel like he’s at his best,” Kotsay said. “His zone was a little bit small. I mean, he made some borderline pitches that we just didn’t get and that sometimes is the game.
“He gave us everything he had tonight and it just wasn’t his night.”
After Ginn surrendered three runs on two walks and three singles in the fifth inning, reliever Justin Sterner came up with two clutch strikeouts to limit the damage.
While he would later give up a home run to Diamondbacks outfielder Alek Thomas, Kotsay praised for Sterner, who holds a 4.35 ERA in 39 innings this year.
“(It was) one fastball that was down the middle that got hit out of the ballpark. But, other than that, he had a pretty good outing,” Kotsay said.
The A’s will wrap up the three-game series vs. the Diamondbacks on Sunday, a rubber match after splitting the first two games. Rookie Jack Perkins (0-1, 2.75 ERA) will make his first MLB start for the A’s, while Ed Rodriguez (3-7, 5.63) will go for Arizona.
