Luis Severino #40 of the Athletics pitches against the San Francisco Giants during the first inning at Sutter Health Park on May 16, 2026 in Sacramento, California. (Photo by Scott Marshall/Getty Images)

By Jeremiah Salmonson

WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The Athletics were back in action on Saturday night at Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento to take on the San Francisco Giants. It was game two of a three-game series as the A’s looked to win the series after defeating the Giants 5-2 on Friday night.

The A’s couldn’t mount a comeback against the Giants on Saturday as they fell 6-4.

Luis Severino got the ball for what was his 10th start of the year for the Athletics, looking to pick up his third win in those attempts. Severino struggled in the outing and failed to deliver a quality start. Severino did manage to give the A’s six innings, but it was riddled with five runs on 10 hits, and he added two walks in the outing. It wasn’t what the A’s needed and still, to some degree, expect from their number one starter. Severino needed 96 pitches to get through his six innings of work.

What was A’s manager Mark Kotsay’s assessment of Luis Severino tonight?

“I think the ball was just up tonight,” Kotsay said after the game.

As for Severino, his opinion of his outing was slightly different.

“I feel I was getting through, throwing good pitches, some hits,” Severino said after the game. “I feel like there was not a lot of solid contact but the two homers and then the Arraez double. Everything else was just a blooper.”

Well, that’s certainly one way to describe an outing in which you gave up 10 hits and walked two batters.

The A’s bullpen came on for the rest of the game starting in the seventh inning.

Scott Barlow tossed the seventh inning for the A’s and struggled, giving up a run on two hits but managing to limit the damage. Barlow threw 16 pitches in the inning while walking none and striking out two.

In the eighth and ninth innings, the A’s sent Mark Leiter Jr. to the mound to keep things where they were in hopes of mounting a comeback. In the eighth inning, it was relatively smooth sailing for Leiter Jr. as he allowed only one hit and struck out one in a scoreless frame. In the ninth inning, he pitched another scoreless inning with his only blemish being a hit while striking out one more. All in, Leiter Jr. went two innings, allowing two hits and no runs while striking out two.

On the offensive side of the ball, it was a pretty tame performance from the green and gold as their offense didn’t get much going until the second half of the game.

The A’s got on the board for the first time in the fifth inning when Jeff McNeil got an RBI on a force out that scored Lawrence Butler from third base.

The A’s didn’t score again until the eighth inning when Brent Rooker hit a three-run home run to deep left field off Caleb Killian to make it a 6-4 ballgame. Rooker’s blast, his second hit of the night, traveled 407 feet and left the bat at 109.5 MPH. It was the sixth home run and 19th, 20th, and 21st RBI of the season for the A’s designated hitter.

The A’s didn’t score again the rest of the game and finished with six hits and three walks.

With the win, the Giants improved to 19-27 while the A’s fell to 23-22 in the 2026 season.

The A’s and Giants will play the rubber game of the series on Sunday at 1 p.m. PST at Sutter Health Park. Jeffrey Springs (3-3, 4.22 ERA) is slated to start for the A’s while the Giants will send Adrian Houser (1-4, 5.79 ERA) to the hill as both teams look for the series win.