The Houston Astros avoided a sweep of Tuesday’s doubleheader and a sweep of the series with a one run 5-4 win over the A’s at the Oakland Coliseum. Both teams have two more games left in the series Wednesday and Thursday. (@astros image)

Houston 5 6 0

Oakland 4 8 1

Seven innings (second game)

Tue Sep 8, 2020

A’s home team

By Lewis Rubman

OAKLAND–Neither of the starting pitchers in tonight’s set to brought an enviable record for 2020 to the mound with him. Chase de Jong, Houston’s right handed hurler had pitched a mere two-thirds of an inning this year and managed to give up two earned runs that period.

That’s a pretty small sample size but a pretty ugly sample. For the first two frames, it looked like a misleading sample. De Jong looked sharp and struck out three of the seven A’s he faced. But in the third, he lost his touch. Vimael Machín led off with a solid single to left center and advanced to third on Tony La Stella’s one out single to center.

Three pitches later, Machín cossed the plate on Tony Kemp’s sac fly to right. Matt Olson’s 11th homer of the year drove in both baserunners and gave Oakland a 4-0 lead. De Jong stumbled through the next two batters to end the inning, his last.

Mike Minor’s numbers were not preposessing either. He had gone 0-5, 5.60 for Texas and entered the game 0-0, 18.00 for the A’s. He, too, started the game well, breezing through his first three innings, giving up only one hit, a single, and a walk. But he surrendered singles to Myleas Straw and Michael Brantley to open the fourth. He got Yuli Gurriel out on a fly to center, but Laureano caught it at the wall.

Minor then walked Kyle Tucker and hit Carlos Correa to load them bases. That ended his hard day’s night. Yusmeiro Petit got the second out when Aledmys Díaz lined out to center. But the usually reliable Petit walked Abraham Toro and Dustin Garneau, bringing in two runs that were charged to Minor, as was the tying run, which Correa scored on George Springer’s infielde single Petit finallly got the third out when Straw skied to center..

The A’s threatened in the sixth when, with two down, they loaded the bases on a walk to Canha, a single by Machín, who went three for three, with a double, and another walk to Jonah Heim, But La Stella’s fly to left ended that.

JB Wendelken was on the mound in the top of the seventh when Pinder, playing third, and Machín, at short, got in each other’s way on a ground ball from the bat of Springer. It was charged as an error to Machín. An infield single, a walk, and Gurriel’s sac fly to center was all the ‘stros needed to push the winning run across, thus earning a split in the day-night double header.

The winners used four pitchers in addition to De Jong, ex-Athletic Brad Peacock, Brooks Raley, Enoli Paredes, who got the win, and Ryan Pressly, who was credited with his eighth save. Paredes now is 2-2, 3.45.

The A’s also used five hurlers, Minor, Petit, TJ McFarland, Lou Trivino, and Wendelken, who took the loss in spite of having turned in the best performance of the quintet.

The two teams will face each other again tomorrow, Roberto Clemente Day, at 6:10. The probable starters are Jesús Luzardo (2-2,4.23) for Oakland and Luis García for Houston.