Oakland A’s catcher Sean Murphy (left) see A’s pitcher Cole Irvin (center) off as he’s relieved and Matt Chapman (right) pats him off in the bottom of the fourth inning at T Mobile Field in Seattle in first game of the three game series on Mon Sep 27, 2021 (AP News photo)

Mariners Continue to Dominate A’s 13-4

By Barbara Mason

Monday night the Oakland A’s took on the Seattle Mariners in a three game series at T-Mobile Park. The A’s will finish the 2021 season on the road. Both teams were in the wild card hunt but hopes for a playoff berth have dimmed significantly. The A’s loss on Monday puts them three games back of the second Wild Card spot. Seattle still has a shot if they can win tonight.

The A’s got off to a nice start taking the lead 3-0 when Seth Brown hit a homer bringing Matt Olson and Mark Canha home. By the third inning Seattle had tied the game and in the fourth inning took an 8-4 lead when Mitch Haniger hit a home run with J.P Crawford and Ty France on base.

It was another disappointing outing for Cole Irvin who lasted only 4 1/2 innings. In the fourth inning Guerra came in to relieve Irving . He allowed 2 hits and the Haniger homerun. It took James Kaprielian who came in to relieve Guerra to get out of the fourth inning.

Again a terrible letdown by the Bullpen as well as the starting pitching. This has been the case for Oakland for the past few months and a huge part of what is going wrong right now for the team.

Kaprielian got out of the fourth inning and through the fifth but in the sixth inning disaster struck again when Mitch Hanigan came to the plate. He hit another homer, his second of the game, and Seattle had taken an 11-4 lead.

It was yet another ugly game against the Seattle Mariners, a replay of games played all season with these guys. There have been a number of teams that seem to have Oakland figured out but Seattle is the team that is the most prominent. Oakland has lost 12 of 15 games against Seattle this season.

In the seventh inning Sam Moll came to the mound to relieve Kaprielian. He allowed a bunt, he hit Tom Murphy and walked Dylan Moore to load the bases with one out.

Two more runs would come in extending Seattle’s lead to 13-4. With two outs Hanigan would come to the plate looking for his third homer of the game. He did not get that third home run but Seattle did signigicant damage in the seventh inning.

The final in this game was 13-4 and with this win the Mariners are 1 1/2 games behind the Red Sox for the second wild card. First pitch in tomorrows game two is scheduled for 7:10 PM. Frankie Montas will be on the mound for Oakland and for the Mariners it will be Logan Gilbert.