by Jerry Feitelberg

Detroit- The Oakland A’s outlasted the Detroit Tigers Thursday night in a game that was fifteen minutes late starting due to a rainstorm. The rain did not dampen the A’s bats as they came back from a four-run deficit and beat the Tigers behind a grand slam by Jed Lowrie in the eighth to win the contest by a score of 9-8.

The starting pitchers for both teams did not fare well. The Tigers’ lefty Chad Bell exited the game in the fourth inning. Bell was looking for his first win of the year, and that did not happen. He didn’t lose either. Bell’s line was 3 & 1/3rd innings pitched, and he allowed five hits and three runs. The A’s starter, Daniel Gossett, did not go five innings again. Gossett usually pitches well in the first two innings but loses it in the third, fourth, or fifth inning. That was his modus operandi on Tuesday evening. The A’s staked him to a 3-1 lead after three innings. The Tigers scored one in the third to make it 3-2 and then plated four more in the bottom of the fifth to take a 6-3 lead and send Gossett to the showers.

The A’s scored one in the top of the sixth to trail 6-4, but the Tigers came back in the bottom of the inning with two more runs to take a commanding 8-4 lead. The A’s got one back in the seventh and were trailing by three until the fateful eighth inning.

With the Tigers’ Alex Wilson pitching, the A’s loaded the bases with no out as Joey Wendle, Franklin Barreto, and Chad Pinder all singled. The next batter, the A’s double machine Jed Lowrie, made his way to the plate. Lowrie, hitting left-handed, hit his third-career grand slam to propel the A’s into the lead 9-8. Bob Melvin called on Chris Hatcher to pitch. Melvin was hoping that HAtcher could keep the Tigers off the board. Hatcher did his job, but the team and all the A’s fans either listening to the radio, watching on television or in the stands in Detroit were squirming. Miguel Cabrera singled to start the rally. He went to third on Nick Castellanos’ double. Hatcher retired Candelario for the first out. Melvin ordered the next hitter to be walked intentionally to load the bases and set up a possible double play. Hatcher struck out James McCann for the second out and also struck out Mikie Mahtook for the third out as the Tigers could not capitalize on a bases-loaded no out situation.

Blake Treinen pitched the ninth for Oakland and was able to close out the game and secure the win for the A’s.

Game Notes- The Tigers used seven pitchers and the A’s used six. Santiago Casilla, who pitched the seventh, was the winning pitcher and Alex Wilson absorbed the loss. The A’s won their fifth game of the nine-game road trip and will close out the trip on Wednesday afternoon in Detroit.

Jed Lowrie was the hitting star for Oakland. Jed hit his 47th double of the season to tie the team record held by Jason Giambi in 2001. Lowrie hit his third grand slam of his career and drove in five runs. Matt Olson hit his 23rd of the year. He tied an Oakland rookie record by hitting homers in five consecutive games, and it was his twelfth in his last sixteen contests.The A’s have now hit 221 homers this season.

Ian Kinsler, Alex Presley, and Nick Castellanos each hit a solo home run for Detroit.

Game three of the three-game set will be played Wednesday in Detroit. Game time will be at 10:10 am. Anibal Sanchez will pitch for the Tigers, and Daniel Mengden will go for the A’s. Mengden pitched a two-hit complete game against the Phillies last week.