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By Tim Byrnes<\/p>\n
The Athletics concluded their future-home \u201chomestand\u201d in Las Vegas, taking 2-of-3 games against the Colorado Rockies, and finishing 4-2 in Nevada. The bats loved the time away from Sutter Health Park, but the pitchers were absolutely shelled at Las Vegas Ballpark, and are probably glad to have moved on.<\/p>\n
(Athletics: 6-4)
In a change of pace, the A\u2019s won the series opener 6-4, and \u201c61-Jump Street\u201d, Gage Jump, started against the Rockies Sean Sullivan. Jump scattered five hits over 5.0 innings, holding Colorado scoreless through the fifth, with six strikeouts.<\/p>\n
Kyle Karros and TJ Rumfield had back-to-back singles in the first inning, and Jump allowed a two out single to Paxton Fulford in the second but nobody scored. Jump mixed in six (0-2) counts in his outing and was effective until the sixth inning.<\/p>\n
Back-to-back solo-home runs by Shea Langeliers and Nick Kurtz gave the Athletics a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the fifth.<\/p>\n
After Jump loaded the bases in the sixth, reliever Justin Sterner took over and gave up an RBI sacrifice fly snd a three run homer to Cole Carrigg to give a 4-2 lead to Colorado.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A Max Muncy RBI-double tied the game at 4-4 in the sixth and a throwing error by Rockies catcher Hunter Goodman scored Lawrence Butler from third base in the seventh to add an insurance run.<\/p>\n
Mason Barnett worked the seventh, and into the eighth for the win. Hogan Harris had a four-out save to bring the A\u2019s record in series openers, to 8-15.<\/p>\n
(Athletics: 7-5)
Henry Bolte\u2019s two out RBI-single in the first inning scored Kurtz and Langeliers, to take an early 2-0 lead. Rockies catcher Brett Sullivan hit a solo bomb to open the third inning to cut the lead to 2-1 and added another run in the fourth, on an RBI single by Troy Johnston.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Later in the inning, the A\u2019s responded with a Zack Gelof two run dinger to extend the lead to 4-2, but Colorado ran off A\u2019s starter Joey Estes when Karros tripled and scored on a sacrifice fly. The Rockies scored three times in the inning to take a 5-4 lead, but the Athletics responded by batting around in the suxth inning.<\/p>\n
Alika Williams\u2019s RBI single with two outs in the sixth tied the game at 5-5, and Tyler Soderstrom doubled to give the team the lead back. After reloading the bases, pinch-hitter Carlos Cortes was hit by a pitch and drove Soderstrom in for a 7-5 game.<\/p>\n
Estes, who was recently promoted, lasted just 4.1 innings, gave up four earned runs, and Jose Suarez took the win. There was another Elvis sighting, with Elvis Alvarado having a 1-2-3 ninth for his second save of the year. Alvarado was clocked at over 103 MPH!<\/p>\n
(Rockies: 23-9)
The twelve extra base hits Sunday, by Colorado, says it all in this microcosm of what MLB may be facing when the Athletics relocate to Las Vegas for good in 2028. A\u2019s starter Jeffrey Springs gave up three of the six Colorado home runs to allow eight runs, six earned, and take the loss.
Springs (L 3-7, 5.13) wasn\u2019t the only Athletics pitcher to get shelled, as Luis Medina replaced him in the fifth and he gave up six earned himself.<\/p>\n
Medina was forced to endure struggles when Manager Mark Kotsay didn\u2019t pull him when he was obviously in trouble. His inning included a stretch of: HR-Single-Walk-Single-Double-RBI Sacrifice Fly-Single-Triple, to also give up six runs.<\/p>\n
The entire bullpen was ineffective with Brady Basso and Scott Barlow both allowing four earned runs in the nightmare day on the mound.<\/p>\n
The A\u2019s didn\u2019t go to sleep at the plate either with six extra base hits of their own in the 23-9 shellacking. Soderstrom homered and doubled, and Butler had three singles to continue to show he is a new man at the plate.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Alika Williams had a pair of singles and at one point had seven consecutive hits to continue massive production at the bottom of the lineup, and Muncy hit a 2-run homer.<\/p>\n
Baseball should expect high batting averages and higher ERA\u2019s in the hot Las Vegas air and may produce similar numbers as the Rockies do in Colorado when the Athletics relocate for good.<\/p>\n
Next: Pirates 6\/15 6:40pm Sutter Health Park West Sacramento, Ca<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Tim Byrnes The Athletics concluded their future-home \u201chomestand\u201d in Las Vegas, taking 2-of-3 games against the Colorado Rockies, and finishing 4-2 in Nevada. The bats loved the time away from Sutter Health Park, but the pitchers were absolutely shelled at Las Vegas Ballpark, and are probably glad to have moved on.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11059],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-96981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baseball-2"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=96981"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96981\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":96993,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96981\/revisions\/96993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=96981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=96981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=96981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}