Sears, Rooker lead A’s to 5th straight win

The Oakland A’s are one win away from .500.

The Oakland Athletics are on a roll and no one, especially not the 9-25 Arraez-less Miami Marlins, can stop them.

As has consistently been the case throughout this surprise run, the A’s almost-winning formula — they’re still one win away from that glorious .500 record — has started with their pitching. The staff as a whole has averaged exactly 3 earned runs per game over their last ten and hasn’t shown any signs of slowing down.

Today, JP Sears held up his end of the bargain, fighting through some early trouble to end his night with an efficient 6 ¹⁄₃ innings of scoreless baseball. He also collected 6 strikeouts and a mere 5 baserunners along the way. Along with Paul Blackburn and Ross Stripling, the A’s have solidified a trio of consistent starters in their rotation who give them a solid chance to win ballgames.

Sears had help behind him on defense, especially on this leaping run-saving play from Darell Hernaiz at shortstop.

The team’s offense, meanwhile, has been determined to get just enough timely hits and runs to win most of their games the past two weeks. Each day, there’s typically one or two guys who are made to look like heroes since they’re the only source of offense that game. That hero tonight was Brent Rooker, who crushed a 95 mph sinker from Ryan Weathers to deep center field, scoring Abraham Toro along the way and putting the A’s up 2-0.

That two-run blast also lifted the A’s to third in the league in homeruns with 38 of them in the first 33 games. Esteury Ruiz secured an insurance run for the A’s in the bottom of the 5th with a groundball to Tim Anderson at short. Blazing down the line with his elite speed, he pressured Anderson to chuck a wild throw away from first base and getting Max Schuemann in from third.

Coming in to hold that lead, Austin Adams did a fine job getting Sears and the A’s out of the 7th with a runner on first. Manager Mark Kotsay then went with an untraditional option for the 8th, calling on Michael Kelly, who’s pitched well but has mainly been used in uncompetitive games. Though he succeeded in getting a quick couple of outs, he followed that up by allowing a single and a walk that forced Kotsay to insert Lucas Erceg an out early.

The now-elite setup man has been getting some save situations here and there as the team manages Mason Miller’s workload. Tonight, Erceg had the extra challenge of getting the 4-out save. Though he hit his first batter to load he bases, he got Anderson looking on an 87 mph slider that dropped right into the top of the zone, ending the inning and avoiding catastrophe.

He kept it going with a couple of strikeouts to start the 9th, but he followed that up by allowing an unfortunate pair of hits — a single and the double — that granted the Marlins their first run of the game and making it a 3-1 game. Fortunately, it ended there as Erceg battled Jesus Sanchez into a 3-2 count before inducing a groundout to the new kid, Brett Harris, to end the game. Though he struggled in his first trio of major league at-bats, securing the final out of the game, even with an excessively high throw to first, had to feel good for the 25-year-old rookie.

The A’s are now 16-17, just 1.5 games back from the top of the AL West. Their -30 run differential point a bit of flukiness in their success, but possessing arguably the league’s best bullpen can make up for a lot of shortcomings elsewhere. With a win tomorrow, the A’s will secure a sixth straight victory, their third straight series win, and finally a .500 record for the first time since the second day of last season.