Monday’s game was exactly what we expected from the Oakland A’s 2022 season, but with the roles reversed.
It all went wrong for the Tampa Bay Rays, and everyone on the A’s responded by playing like a superstar, resulting in a 13-2 hit at Tropicana Field.
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The day headed south for Tampa Bay almost immediately. Looking at his fourth batter of the game, Ray’s starter Luis Patino overexerted himself diagonally to the left and had to leave the game. Just two outs tonight called them to the bullpen, and their rescuer dropped a batsman on his first throw and allowed homers on his fourth throw and ninth throw. A few defensive mistakes in the infield later made things worse.
Oakland took full advantage. They scored four runs in that 1st inning, then four more in the 2nd, another in the 4th, and four more in the 9th. They ended up having four things started, including a grand slam to round out the last frame, and 13 Hits knocked out with three walks and an HBP. More than half of their hits went to extra bases, and they went 4-to-10 with runners in the scoring position.
On the other side of the ball, A’s starter Paul Blackburn was brilliant. Set for a tremendous early lead, he stormed through five scoreless innings, missing batters like we’ve never seen before and hitting a career-high seven batters. Three helpers made it through the rest of the way without drama.
Early Offense
Patiño’s injury got the day off to a bad start and left the Rays concerned from the start. Sometimes everyone comes up in an emergency bullpen game, and a parade of assists surprisingly keeps the opposing lineup in the dark for nine innings. That wasn’t the case tonight.
First out of the pen was Chris Mazza. The right-hander is an East Bay product who was born in Walnut Creek, attended Clayton Valley High School in Concord, and then stayed nearby at Menlo College in Atherton.
Entering with one runner in second and two in second, Mazza’s first pitch slipped out of his hand and got stuck Sean Murphy in the rear, so wild that it almost passed behind him without contact. Next was Seth Brown, and he blew up the third climb he saw, 427 feet at an exit speed of 108.5 miles per hour. Brownie Blast in three runs!
Then came Chad Pinder, and he also went deep and made it back-to-back homers. Brown and Pinder have already fielded twice in the first four games this year.
The charge continued in the 2nd inning. Two singles led out of frame, and the Rays lost a grounder on the turf to a field error to send a runner home. With two on and still nobody out Elvis Andres left the building for a three-run offender.
The score was now 8-0 and the rest of the game felt like a formality, although one thing the last year has taught us is that it’s not over until it’s over. But it turned out that this one was really over.
Mazza made it through the 3rd inning but had more trouble in the 4th. Another infield error and a pair of singles loaded the bases, and the Rays hesitated a moment too long on a potential inning-ending double-play grounder, allowing Murphy to hit it and run to score.
After that, Tampa Bay finally got back into their bullpen and Oakland’s lineup settled down for a while, before a final cry erupted at the end.
With play already out of reach, the Rays switched to right fielder Brett Phillips to the hill to bad luck. That alone was worth the price of admission as everyone’s favorite Phillips put on quite a show. He delivered the ball at an average speed of 46.7 mph and the The strangest whorl you’ve ever seenand talked to a friendly trash makes his opponent laugh. Then he made one amazing dive of a popup in Foul Territory that almost slides into the dugout.
The only thing he didn’t get was the last zero on the scoreboard. He made it through the 8th inning unscathed, but in the 9th he loaded bases and Sheldon New connected for a Grand Slam.
“Your body just doesn’t want to wait that long,” Neuse told mid-40s Velocity. per Matt Kawahara of the SF Chronicle.
The whole game was a weird situation, but the A’s went about their business. It’s easy to write off a day with big points when the opponent runs into unexpected trouble, but it’s also no guarantee that this will happen. Sometimes the sudden turn throws your lineup off course as well, and everyone faces a different arm on each attack, and three hours later you’re wondering why nobody was able to sit down and fix something. Not today, when the ragtag band of hitters came through emphatically.
Murphy even released his first career triple!
Evil Blackburn
While Oakland’s lineup shattered everything they saw, their pitching team held serve just as strong.
Starter Paul Blackburn was as evil as we have never seen him. He faced 19 batters and knocked out seven of them, scoring a dozen swinging strikes that accounted for 17% of the pitches he threw and 41% of all swings against him. Those are monster numbers from a pitcher not known for missing bats, and they added up to five dominant innings in which the Rays didn’t even get to third base.
- black brandy: 5 IP, 0 runs, 7 Ks, 1 BB, 3 hits, 71 pitches
There were a few loud outs against him, but this was a season debut that exceeded all reasonable expectations. Team insider Martin Gallegos notes that Blackburn was “tinkering with new holds this offseason and found one for a more ‘swingy’ slider” that registered with Statcast as a curveball and got more wind than any of his other pitches. Blackburn mentioned that curve along with a few other things that went well tonight.
The A’s turned to their pen on the 6th, and Tampa Bay scratched a few runs in trash time. But it was too late, and too little Zach Jackson, AJ Puk (2 innings) and Justin Grimm sucked up the last few frames.
are we having fun yet
The first two games of the year were as we expected, and Oakland’s underdog roster was knocked over. The last two were something else entirely, with a matter-of-fact win over the Phillies and now a savage loss to the Rays.
That doesn’t mean they’ll suddenly be up-and-coming contenders based on two early wins, but they do show they won’t go down easily, and that Opponents have to take them seriously. At least they’re more fun than we dared hope.
What will the next six months bring? We’ll have to wait and see, but it certainly hasn’t been a boring conversion so far.