[tag San Francisco Giants, MLB,baseball]

by Jerry Feitelberg

A Tale of Two Teams

To quote Charles Dickens, it would be safe to say that it is “the best of times and the worst of times”

It is the best of times for the Oakland Athletics as they beat the San Francisco Giants by a score of 6-1.

For the A’s it was their sixth win in a row and their fifty-seventh of the year which is the most in A’s history before the All-Star game. For the Giants it definitely the worst of times as they lost for the eleventh time in the last thirteen games and are 7-20 after going 42-21 in the first 63 games. Their offense has gone south and they just missed being shut out for the fifth time in nine games.

The scoring summary follows below.

The A’s scored the first run of the game in the bottom of the third against Madison Bumgarner.

Jed Lowrie led off with a bloop single. Alberto Callaspo then hit a blooper to right and Giants’ right fielder Hunter Pence made a fantastic play to rob Callaspo of a hit. Pence then egged the A’s fans on in the right field bleachers and A’s second baseman Nick Punto then lined a double down the left field line to drive in Lowrie. The A’s fans were ecstatic and the crowd made a ton of noise partly in retribution for Pence’s gesture and partly in joy for getting a run on the board. Coco Crisp followed with a single to drive in Punto with the second run of the inning and took second on the throw home. Coco then stole third to put a man on third with just one out. It was Crisp’s sixteenth steal of the year. A’s All-Star, Yoenis Cespedes singled to center and that allowed crisp to score with the third run of the inning.

Josh Donaldson walked and that was followed by a Derek Norris single to drive in Cespedes. The throw from Tyler Colvin got past Buster Posey and the runners advanced to put men on at second and third with two out. Nate Freiman struck out to end the inning but the A’s batted around and have a 4-0 lead after the end of three innings.

The A’s knocked Bumgarner out the game in the bottom of the eighth. Bumgarner walked Derek Norris to start the inning. Big Nate Freiman doubled down the right field line to score Norris with the fifth run of the game for the A’s. Umpire Angel Hernandez called a balk on Giant’s pitcher Jean Machi and that allowed Freiman to advance to third. Freiman scored on Alberto Callaspo’s single and the A’s have a 6-1 lead after eight. A’s bring in Ryan Cook to finish the game and after giving up a single to Tyler Colvin, Cook gets the next three hitters and the A’s win 6-1.

Game notes: The A’s recorded the 11th undefeated home stand of six or more games in Oakland history.

Sonny Gray improved his record to 9-3 and went seven innings for the third time in his last four starts.

A’s starters have now tossed six or more innings allowing one run or fewer in six straight games which is the longest streak since 1914. That’s 100 years,folks.

Line score for the A’s was six runs, eleven hits and no errors while the Giants posted one run, eight hits and one error. The third game of the series is Wednesday night in San Francisco. Jason Hammel will make his debut for the A’s and the Giants will counter with Matt Cain. Game time is at 7:15pm.