Seattle Mariners starter Bryan Woo throws to the Sacramento A’s line up at T Mobile Field in Seattle on Sun Sep 6, 2026 in game four of their four game series. (AP News photo)

By Maurcio Segura

The Sacramento Athletics were on the doorstep of a four-win sweep of the Seattle Mariners, but Bryan Woo turned the finale into a long afternoon for the Green and Gold. Woo held the A’s to one hit over eight scoreless innings, struck out nine and allowed only two walks before Andrés Muñoz retired the side in order in the ninth to finish Seattle’s 2-0 win.

For three innings, Gage Jump matched Woo almost pitch for pitch. Seattle managed a Randy Arozarena single in the first, but Jump worked around it and struck out Julio Rodríguez and Cal Raleigh to close the inning. He then retired the Mariners in order in the second and third, giving the A’s every chance to strike first.

Their best early chance belonged to Henry Bolte. He lined a single to left in the fourth for the Athletics’ first and only hit, then stole second with two outs. Lawrence Butler grounded out to end the inning, leaving Bolte stranded. The hit fit Bolte’s recent run at the plate. He was batting .333 over his previous 21 games before the finale. Butler, meanwhile, brought a 14-game hitting streak into the game, the longest active streak in the majors, while Jeff McNeil ranked second in the majors with a .351 average since the All-Star break. Neither Butler nor McNeil managed a hit.

Seattle finally broke through in the bottom of the fourth, and it did so with a wave of singles. Dominic Canzone and Rodríguez opened the inning with back-to-back hits. Raleigh followed with a single to left that scored Canzone, and J.P. Crawford drove in Rodríguez with another single. Josh Naylor then singled to load the bases with nobody out.

That inning could have gotten away from Jump. Instead, the left-hander stopped the damage at two runs by striking out Weston Wilson, Michael Arroyo and Jhonny Pereda in succession. Jump finished with four innings, six hits, two earned runs, no walks and seven strikeouts. Those seven strikeouts pushed him from 99 to 106 for the season after he began the day fourth in Athletics history in strikeouts through a pitcher’s first 18 career games.

The bullpen did everything it could to keep the game within reach. Seth Johnson replaced Jump and struck out Arozarena, Canzone and Rodríguez in order in the fifth, then fanned Raleigh in the sixth before two fly balls ended the inning. Scott Blewett followed with a scoreless seventh, and Yunior Tur worked around an Arozarena single and a Raleigh walk in the eighth. Athletics pitchers finished with 13 strikeouts and did not allow another run after the fourth.

The offense never found a counterattack. Donovan Walton drew walks in the fifth and eighth, but neither developed into a scoring threat. Aside from those two walks, Woo retired every batter he faced after Bolte’s fourth-inning single, including strikeouts of Zack Gelof and Butler in the seventh. Muñoz then handled the ninth with little drama, getting Bolte on a grounder, striking out McNeil and retiring Gelof on another ground ball.

The loss ended the A’s four-game winning streak and denied them a sweep after they had taken the first three games of the series. Even so, the pitching staff gave the offense eight innings to find two runs. This time, one hit was all the Athletics could produce, and Seattle made its five-single fourth inning stand for the rest of the afternoon.

Next up, the A’s return home Mon Sep 7th with Jacob Lopez (6-4, 4.71 ERA, 103 K) facing Toronto’s Dylan Cease (10-5, 2.25 ERA, 221 K), a matchup that gives the bats no easy reset, with first pitch set for 7:05 p.m. Pacific.

Costa Rican-born Mauricio Segura has been covering sports in the Bay Area since 2001 for a variety of magazines and newspapers, as well as his own publication, Golden Bay Times.