MidValleySports.Com

By Tim Byrnes

The LA Angels have been the “Newman” of A’s baseball all season; sweeping them twice, and coming into the weekend series 7-0 versus the Athletics in 2025.

Seinfeld references aside, the Athletics came into this three game series winning four of their last six series and hitting the ball better so expectations were high.

The A’s took the first two-of-three games by hitting everything in sight. They batted .302 as a team with five doubles and eight home runs to finally hit the win column against their Southern California counterparts.

Until the 10th inning of the series finale, the A’s bullpen had been basically unhittable. They went 12 1/3 innings of two-hit, scoreless baseball before the wheels fell off and the A’s lost the finale 11-5.

Athletics Batting:
“Players Weekend” had colorful bats in West Sacramento, seven A’s hitters had hits in every game they played in, and this was truly a total team effort.

Handling center field while Denzel Clarke continues to deal with injury was given to recently promoted Colby Thomas. Fresh from AAA Las Vegas having scratched out a .291/.366/.529 stats line with 21 doubles, 18 home runs, and 74 RBI’s, Thomas has continued to see the ball well at the big league level. Batting .444 with five runs and seven rbi’s in the last two series, primarily batting cleanup, he presents a nice problem to have when Clarke returns.

Thomas homered in the first two games versus the Angels and has hit safely in 7-of-9 games.

Left fielder Tyler Soderstrom had hits in every game to extend his active hitting streak to an MLB-leading 15 games.

First baseman Nick Kurtz, designated hitter Brent Rooker, and catcher Shea Langeliers all hit their 25th home runs on the year with Langeliers adding his 26th on Sunday.

Kurtz had gone into the series with just two extra-base-hits (xbh) since his four home run game and had zero home runs in the previous 15 games.

He batted .455 against LA with a double, two home runs, four RBI’s, and five runs to lead a potent offense. He added four walks to prove that he made the proper adjustments to his problem hitting back foot sliders.

The “Big Amish” leads rookies in home runs, runs-batted-in, and extra-base-hits and is the favorite for AL Rookie of the Year.

Athletics Pitching:
Rookie starters Jack Perkins and Luis Morales both went five innings, allowed five hits, and came away with victories against the Angels.

Perkins (2-2) struck out seven, gave up three earned runs and in spite of the early basepath traffic he settled down by mixing up his pitches better.

Morales (1-0) notched his first professional win by sprinkling five singles and allowing only one run.

The only veteran in the rotation, Jeffrey Springs, had his second straight poor start giving up five runs in the finale and not factoring in the decision.

Injury Update:
Denzel Clarke reaggravated his right adductor during his AAA rehab assignment and won’t be returning to the majors just yet.
All-Star shortstop Jacob Wilson went 2-for-4 in his rehab in Vegas and is expected to return to the majors by August 19th.

Upcoming Series:
After a rare Monday off, the Athletics (56-70) head to Minnesota to take on the Twins (58-66).

The Twins were sellers at the trade deadline, trading stud Carlos Correa back to Houston, among a 10-player payroll dump.

The Twins were just swept at home by the Detroit Tigers, and have lost five of their last six games while the A’s have won 5-of-7 series.

The A’s send LHP Jacob Lopez (6-6, 3.30) to face the Twins top arm RHP Joe Ryan (12-5, 2.72) with Lopez on a 24 2/3 innings scoreless streak.

In his last three starts Lopez is 3-0 with a 0.00 era while Ryan has gone 2-0, 2.04 era over the same timeframe.

GameTime:
August 19, 2025 440pm
Target Field
Minneapolis, Minn