Photo credit: @Athletics

By Matthew Harrington

Sean Manaea is a Cy Young front-runner. Oakland A’s fans are happy to hear those words uttered, not from overly optimistic fanboys but uttered from the mouths of the nation’s finest sports writers. Six starts into the 2018 season, the Throwin’ Samoan has given the A’s something they didn’t expect when mapping out the 2018 season: a bonafide ace.

Manaea (4-2, 1.03 ERA) held the Houston Astros (17-10) reigning World Champions and one of the hottest teams on the planet, to just one run at home Friday night, with the A’s (14-12) throttling Houston 8-1. Manaea followed up his masterpiece no-hitter over Chris Sale and the Boston Red Sox Saturday by emphatically outdueling another team’s ace, Dallas Keuchel, Friday. Manaea fired seven innings, allowing four hits while striking out seven. He now leads the American League with four wins, holds the AL’s lowest ERA at 1.03 and leads the Majors with a 0.62 WHIP. To put it simply, he’s the best.

The only run Manaea gave up Friday the Astros had to scrap for. George Springer reached base in the bottom of the fourth after Marcus Semien’s throwing error, moved to second base on a sacrifice fly then came home on Carlos Correa’s RBI single. When all was said and done, Manaea’s line would read one run, unearned. He also allowed just the one walk, throwing 65 of 95 pitches for strikes.

The A’s spotted Manaea a run in the top of the fifth to tie the game on Matt Chapman’s sixth homer of the season, then Pinder tagged Keuchel (1-4, 4.00) with a two-run shot for a 3-1 lead in the top of the 6th. Matt Olson would single home a run in the seventh, but Mark Canha’s fourth homer in the inning off Keuchel would be the backbreaker and a 6-1 lead.

For how well Manaea was pitching,  a 6-1 lead felt like a 500-run lead, not a five-run lead. The A’s made the mountain all the more insurmountable when Jed Lowrie tripled home two runs for an 8-1 lead. Ryan Dull and Santiago Casilla pitched scoreless innings to give Oakland the win.

Manaea’s performance moves Oakland just 2.5 games back of the lead in the AL West leaders Los Angeles & Houston. If Manaea continues to pitch up to the potential that made him the centerpiece of the Ben Zobrist trade in 2015, they could make some noise in division. They’ll look to continue their quest for legitimacy Saturday when Daniel Mengden opposes the Astros’ Lance McCullers in Game 2 of the series.