By Morris Phillips

The A’s offered a few things on Tuesday night—the final home start for a promising rookie starting pitcher, a kooky play and the resulting controversy, an ejection rooted in passion, competitive play and free parking—but offense was not one of them.

Three hours of baseball, 10 innings, three base hits.  Those three singles allowed the A’s to hang around, but the Astros prevailed, winning 2-1 in extra innings.

Sean Manaea made his second start following a stint on the disabled list, and the rookie was as good as he’s been all season, locating his fastball, finishing hitters with a nasty cutter and a changeup, and showing—once again—that he’s a big piece of the team’s future.

Manaea went six innings, allowing three hits while striking out seven.  He worked briskly, offering first pitch strikes to 12 of the 22 batters he faced.

But the offense wasn’t present to support Manaea.  Coming off their best road trip in more than two years, filled with offense, the A’s have laid eggs in their return to the Coliseum, going the final six innings scoreless on Monday, and the final four empty on Tuesday.  In all, the A’s have dropped five in a row at home.

“Unfortunately, that’s just part of the game, the ebbs and flows that come with it,” Ryon Healy admitted.  “We go on a road trip and we score endless amounts of runs and the offense is always there and you come home, and we scored three runs in the last two nights.  So definitely tough, but something we have to bounce back from and keep pushing forward.”

The Astros kept their faint post-season hopes alive with the win, and long reliever Chris Devenski was a big part of that.  In relief of starter Joe Musgrove, Devenski pitched 3 2/3 innings without allowing a hit, a period in which the Astros pushed across the tying run.  After Devenski denied the A’s in the ninth, the Astros won it when George Springer singled, chasing home teammate Tony Kemp.

In the third inning, players, coaches and umpires were scratching their collective heads, when Jake Marisnick appeared to beat out a bunt, a play intended to move up Teoscar Hernandez, who led off the inning with a base hit.  Marisnick, upon a review that was blessed with a couple of excellent replay angles, was called out on Yonder Alonso’s ever-so-slight swipe tag.

But during the play, Hernandez inexplicably stepped off first base and was also tagged out by Alonso—after Marisnick was declared safe—an act that the umpire’s interpreted to be forgivable in that Hernandez was reacting to the initial, overturned call.  When the umpires conferenced and allowed Hernandez to remain at first base, A’s manager Bob Melvin issued a formal protest.

“I’m just trying to cover my bases, once we got out of the inning, I rescinded it,” Melvin said.  “I don’t know how you can get in the head of a runner and say what he was thinking on that play.”

Jose Altuve, the clear, front runner for AL MVP honors, picked up his 200^th hit of the season in the eighth inning.  Altuve became the first player to accumulate 200 hits in three consecutive seasons since Ichiro Suzuki finished 10 consecutive seasons of 200 hits in 2010.

Danny Valencia had enough of home plate umpire Marty Foster and his shifting strike zone after striking out in the ninth.  Foster ejected Valencia when he too forcefully expressed his feelings about the subject.  The A’s right fielder hitting cleanup was 0 for 4 with two strikeouts.

The A’s conclude their series with the Astros—they’ve now dropped seven straight to their division rivals—on Wednesday afternoon.  Rookie Daniel Mengden will face his hometown team in a matchup with Houston’s Collin McHugh.