Major League Baseball

A's hand Blue Jays third straight loss

Published Aug. 1, 2009 7:33 a.m. ET

foxsports

Ryan Sweeney started the season chasing pitches out of the strike zone. Now the Oakland Athletics' outfielder is helping chase pitchers out of games.

Sweeney tied his career high with three RBIs, Dallas Braden won for the first time in four starts and the A's beat the Toronto Blue Jays 8-5 on Friday night.

"He's always had a nice level swing where he uses the whole field," Oakland manager Bob Geren said of Sweeney. "He's showing some pretty good strike zone discipline of late. Right now he's getting himself in good counts by being selective, aggressively selective, early in the count."