Oakland A’s Brent Rooker is greeted by teammates after slugging a home run in the top of the eighth inning at Guarantee Rate Field in Chicago in the third game of this four game series on Sat Aug 25, 2023 (AP News photo)

By Barbara Mason

The Oakland A’s (38-91) were riding high going into Saturday’s game three against the Chicago White Sox (50-79) but came away disappointed 6-2 at Guarantee Rate Field in Chicago. They couldn’t get a third win this game Saturday and are in front in this four game series 2-1.

It was an awful start for Oakland pitcher JP Sears. He has been struggling for awhile now and the struggles continued in this game. He was not executing his pitches. He went six innings and gave up nine hits and six runs.

The White Sox got things going early scoring a single run in the first inning and followed it up with a single run in the second inning to take a 2-0 lead. Luis Robert Jr. scored Chicago’s first run which was followed by a home run off the bat of Lenyn Sosa.

The White Sox had a second home run in the third inning, a three-run homer from Yoan Moncada taking a 5-0 lead. They would score another run in the fifth inning and with a 6-0 lead it was all White Sox in this game so far. The A’s only had two hits through seven innings.

Oakland would finally get up on the board in the eighth inning thanks to a fielding error from Moncada. Esteury Ruiz scored on that error and so with only one out and two on base Oakland had opportunity to score a few more runs and get a rally going for the A’s.

Oakland was able to bring home another run. Jonah Bride singled Brent Rooker home for a second run and the A’s trailed 6-2 going into the bottom of the eighth.

The White Sox went three up and three out in the eighth and the A’s were looking to finish with a flurry in the ninth inning. Oakland actually went out with a whimper in the final inning but still has the chance to win the series Sunday.

A’s post game notes: The A’s had won game one of the series 8-5 Thursday night and followed that game up Friday night with an offensively brilliant game winning 12-4. Nick Allen had an amazing game in the second game of the series driving in five runs.

Oakland will wrap up the series tomorrow with Paul Blackburn on the mound with a 3-3 win/loss record and a 4.00 ERA. The White Sox will send Mike Clevinger with a 5-6 win/loss record and a 3.47 ERA.

The A’s will be looking to get back the energy they had in the first two games of this series. They will be needing to get their bats going; they will certainly need more than the four hits that they got in Saturday’s game.