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By Tim Byrnes<\/p>\n
At the conclusion of the series with the Blue Jays, one thing was clear. The A\u2019s bats, with the exception of Shea Langeliers, were non-existent. Fans were hoping it was just because the team travelled out of the country, and the opponent was the defending American League Champions. Unfortunately the struggles continued but there is light shining through.<\/p>\n
The series opener started off poorly, with the Braves batting around in the first inning, off of A\u2019s starter Jacob Lopez. Lopez had control issues from the outset and how he got out of his start down only 3-0 is amazing.<\/p>\n
He got behind in the count all outing, going down 2-0 seven times, and was forced into six full-count\u2019s. Contact was weak but the ball kept finding holes and he gave up hits with all of his pitches: 4-seam fastball, cutter, and slider.<\/p>\n
Lopez (0-1, 6.75) lasted just four innings and took the loss. He allowed half the batters he faced to reach base, one way or another, and uncharacteristically failed to strike anyone out.<\/p>\n
The relievers pitched well, allowing only a ninth inning run over four innings, with Justin Sterner standing out with an 11-pitch fifth inning.<\/p>\n
The bats scattered seven hits, but many were with two outs, and it\u2019s difficult to begin a rally with two outs. Brent Rooker and Tyler Soderstrom each had a pair of singles in the 4-0 shutout loss.<\/p>\n
The Athletics finally got in the win column Tuesday by defeating Atlanta 5-2 and did so on the back of the A\u2019s newly acquired starter Aaron Civale. If this is what the A\u2019s get for $6 million, they might want to extend him because other than a solo home run in the first inning by Drake Baldwin and an RBI-single in the fifth, he was solid. Five innings, four hits, and a walk with three k\u2019s was his stat line, and at one point he retired 12-of-13 hitters.<\/p>\n
Sterner had another scoreless inning in relief and as a collective, the relievers didn\u2019t allow a run in four innings. Mark Kotsay decided to try Mark Leiter Jr in the ninth, and he gave up two singles to put the tying run at the plate. Opponents are batting .417 against Leiter Jr and with his high foot traffic, he has no business closing games.<\/p>\n
The bats came alive in the second inning and the Athletics sent eight to the plate. Three walks, two singles, and a Jacob Wilson 2-RBI double led to an early 3-0 lead. Wilson was 2-for-4 on the day, as was Andy Ibanez, and it was a team effort with seven different A\u2019s players reaching base.<\/p>\n
Langeliers hit his fourth home run of the season and he is hitting his way out of our price range. With Scott Boras as his agent, he is unlikely to resign with the Athletics, primarily because they can\u2019t afford him.<\/p>\n
The rubber game went as expected with the Braves sending Chris Sale to the mound, and the A\u2019s lost 5-1. Having led both leagues in strikeouts, the A\u2019s knew it was going to be a long day against Sale, and minus Langeliers league-leading fifth homer with two outs in the fourth inning, the team could only muster one hit in each of the seventh-ninth innings.<\/p>\n
The team went back to poor first time through the lineup, and when you take the lone win away, the A\u2019s are 3-for-45 the first time through, (.066). Jacob Wilson had another double while leading off and Kotsay should leave him there. He is more comfortable versus Nick Kurtz, who is clearly struggling batting at the top of the order, and Wilson batted .351 last season, in that spot.<\/p>\n
Luis Severino struggled with control, took 65 pitches to get through just two innings, and had five walks. Like Lopez in the opener, Severino (0-1, 6.48) allowed half the batters he faced to reach base, but mitigated damage with seven strikeouts.<\/p>\n
Hogan Harris shined, taking just 19 pitches to close the fifth and sixth innings, and may be the front-runner to close games, given the consistency.<\/p>\n
NEXT: Tonight Astros @ A\u2019s 6:40pm-Sutter Health Park<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Tim Byrnes At the conclusion of the series with the Blue Jays, one thing was clear. The A\u2019s bats, with the exception of Shea Langeliers, were non-existent. Fans were hoping it was just because the team travelled out of the country, and the opponent was the defending American League Champions. Unfortunately the struggles continued […]<\/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-95562","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baseball-2"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95562","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=95562"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95562\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":95569,"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95562\/revisions\/95569"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=95562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=95562"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=95562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}