Last Night In Baseball: The Athletics And Angels Had A Wild Friday Night

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The Athletics and Angels had one wild Friday night. Through three innings, the A’s were already up 4-0, but that’s when Los Angeles began to take control. In the top of the fourth, first baseman Nolan Schanuel walked, then second baseman Oswald Peraza doubled. DH Christian Moore then hit a sac fly to put the Angels on the board, and with two outs third baseman Denzer Guzman went yard to make it 4-3, A’s. 

Catcher Logan O’Hoppe would keep it going with a walk, then left fielder Wade Meckler would draw his own free pass. That meant two on for center fielder Jose Siri, who would blast a three-run homer that gave the Angels a 6-4 lead and knocked starter Jeffrey Springs out of the game.

Shortstop Zach Neto would then make it 7-4 with a homer off new pitcher Justin Sterner, and in the next inning, O’Hoppe would go yard with a three-run shot; 10-4, Angels. Schanuel would hit another homer for Los Angeles, a solo dinger, and that’s how far the Angels got before the A’s were able to answer at all.

When the Athletics did answer, though, it came loud and clear. One run in the sixth, then two in the seventh and eighth each — the lead had been cut to 11-9 by the ninth. Sam Bachman came on in relief of Chase Silseth, who in the eighth had allowed a home run to third baseman Max Muncy — who had entered as a pinch-hitter earlier — to make it 11-9 in the first place. Bachman’s luck was not much better. He got catcher Shea Langeliers out to start the inning, but then left fielder Tyler Soderstrom doubled. Shortstop Jacob Wilson grounded out, giving the Angels a chance to win it here and stifle the comeback attempt. Instead, Jonah Heim came on as a pinch-hitter, saw a 99.2 mph sinker middle-middle and launched it into the right field stands.

In the top of the 10th, the Angels had a chance to score the go-ahead run, erasing the A’s seven-run comeback, if only temporarily. Muncy came up big again, however, this time defensively: he corralled an O’Hopper at third and got the throw to home calmly and accurately, allowing Langeliers to take Christian Moore out with time to spare and keep the game tied.

And that made room for the ultimate indignity in the bottom of the 10th. Kirby Yates replaced Bachman on the mound, and he walked center fielder Henry Bolte to put two on. Zach Gelof, who had shifted to second base defensively earlier in the game, was hit by a pitch to load the bases. Samy Natera Jr. relieved Yates to stop what was happening from happening, but he could not.

A literal walk-off to end things — the A’s scored eight unanswered runs, most on big bops, but the final one was a pleasant 90-foot stroll. This was a significant win for the A’s in other ways, too: they are back at .500 on the season, and with the Mariners losing, they now just sit half-a-game out of first in the AL West.

Much, much earlier in the A’s-Angels tilt, Athletics’ manager Mark Kotsay was thrown out for arguing balls and strikes. Most of the arguing happened after the ejection, however: Kotsay was incensed about being tossed for commenting on the accuracy of home plate umpire Dan Merzel from the dugout. The broadcast did not hide the audio on Kotsay’s mic. Good morning, its expletives.

Kotsay does have a point, though: managers can’t call for a challenge, and he felt low strikes were being called — four of them, by his count, at this early juncture of the game. He doesn’t really have a recourse here, and risking potentially limited ABS challenges this early on could have negative consequences later on should it turn out the ump is correct. ABS is working splendidly so far, but Kotsay seemed to mostly be calling for better calls so that ABS wouldn’t need to be leaned on.

The A’s weren’t the only ones with a ninth-inning comeback that led to a win. The Dodgers had to fight back against the Orioles, as Baltimore itself evened things up at 3-3 in the sixth inning thanks to back-to-back homers from shortstop Gunnar Henderson and first baseman Pete Alonso…

…and then Leody Taveras made a catch in right field to end the bottom of the sixth that robbed the Dodgers of a likely run.

To make matters worse, the Orioles then scored two more runs in the top of the seventh, when left fielder Jeremiah Jackson singled in Colton Cowser and Coby Mayo. The Dodgers finally responded in the bottom of the ninth, however. Ryan Helsley came on in relief, and while he retired first baseman Freddie Freeman to start the inning, shortstop Mookie Betts cut the lead in half with a 378-foot solo shot to left.

Third baseman Max Muncy — no, no, the other third baseman Max Muncy — would then walk and be replaced with pinch-runner Alex Call. DH Ryan Ward would walk following the second out of the inning, and, down to the Dodgers’ last strike, catcher Dalton Rushing would deliver.

It should have just been tied 5-5, but right fielder Tyler O’Neill uncorked a throw that didn’t reach the plate with the accuracy it needed — the ball got away from backstop Samuel Basallo, O’Neill was charged with an error, and Ward would continue sprinting from third to score the winning run.

Also wild is that that error and the second run might not have mattered in the end, or even happened at all, if not for a play much earlier in the game. Check out this incredible slide, in which it’s a race between the tip of Basallo’s glove and the tips of second baseman Alex Freeland’s fingers.

The replay shows just how ridiculously close the play was — it’s incredible that home plate ump Nestor Ceja got it right the first time, because all those angles look plenty controversial.

A play so good by the Royals…

…you have to watch it from more than one angle.

That’s Royals’ second baseman Michael Massey making a sliding catch over by shortstop, realizing he can’t get up to make the throw to first and hucking the ball over to Tyler Tolbert, who does make the throw and gets backstop Iván Herrera in time. Even better, this was done in the absence of starting shortstop Bobby Witt Jr., who suffered an MCL sprain and has avoided the IL for now, but couldn’t avoid sitting out at least a couple of games.

What a beauty. When a double-play combo can speak without speaking like this, that’s just some great baseball. Kansas City would end up defeating the Cardinals by the narrow score of 6-5, too, making a play like this even more important in hindsight.

Brewers’ ace Jacob Misiorowski allowed just one run total over his previous eight starts, resulting in the lowest eight-start ERA — 0.17 — since it became an official stat back in 1913, per MLB. To be blunter: no one had ever been as good over an eight-start period as what Miz just did from May 1 through June 12. In addition to the 0.17 ERA, Misiorowski struck out 80 batters against nine walks in 54 ⅓ innings while allowing just 19 hits… only one of them for extra bases.

And yet, this is baseball we’re talking about, and baseball does what it wants. So not only did the Braves score a run against Misiorowski on Friday night in their series opener against the Brewers, but Milwaukee’s 6-foot-7 wonder actually gave up two of them. Or, more than he had allowed over his last month-and-a-half of work. When can two runs be both a lot of runs and not a lot at all? When it’s Miz allowing them.

Center fielder Mauricio Dubón was responsible for both runs, driving in Jorge Mateo and Ozzie Albies on a single in the sixth inning. That put Atlanta up, 2-1, and also effectively ended Misiorowski’s night, as he wouldn’t come back out for the seventh. Abner Uribe came on in relief and gave up what ended up being the game-winning homer to Mike Yastrzemski, his fourth of the year, to give the Braves a 3-1 lead. Milwaukee would score one more, but it wasn’t enough, and the Braves took game one of this series between two of the league’s best — and despite Miz standing in the way, to boot.

Corbin Carroll hits triples. Lots of triples. In fact, his latest — No. 52 in his career — tied him for the most in Diamondbacks’ history, with former shortstop Stephen Drew. 

This isn’t just an Arizona-specific skill, however. Carroll led the National League in triples in 2023, then MLB as a whole in each of the past two seasons. Through June 19, he has nine, once again leading the majors — and his next will give him sole possession of the D-backs’ leaderboard. 

This really was Carroll’s game to shine, too. He was 3-for-4 with four RBIs, a run and a walk against the Twins on Friday, with one of those other two hits a double. Plus, check out this grab he made in right.

Carroll is one of the best players in the league, an offensive force batting .283/.371/.554 who has also improved defensively over the past couple of years. He’s just a lot of fun to watch, and here his performance proved to be the difference in a 9-5 dub for Arizona over Minnesota.

Cam Schlittler is leading the Yankees’ rotation, as well as the American League in ERA. After limiting the Reds to four baserunners and no runs on Friday, Schlittler’s ERA is down to 1.71, and he’s leading the junior circuit in innings with 95, as well. While he’s not first in strikeouts, he did cross the 100-whiff threshold last night, punching out 13 Reds to set a new career-best in what proved to be a 5-0 W for New York.

A dominating performance, and one that has helped the Yankees weather waiting for Gerrit Cole to return from Tommy John surgery, as well as the loss of Max Fried. Cole is back and pitching well, but Fried has been gone for over a month now — Schlittler, though, is doing more than just making up for Fried’s absence.

The Red Sox went on the road for a weekend series in Seattle, and given how poorly the team has played at Fenway this season — just 12-25, to save you the time of looking it up — getting away couldn’t hurt. And so far, so good on that hypothesis. Offseason acquisition Ranger Suarez was shoving against the Mariners, as he took a no-hitter into the seventh inning before finally losing it.

Suarez was pulled after 6 ⅔ innings — no-hitter or no, he was at 94 pitches, so he was potentially not long for the game at that point, anyway. Before exiting, however, he held the M’s to a single hit, walked three and struck out five. His ERA for the season is now 2.93, as well: plenty hasn’t been working for the Red Sox this season, but Suarez has not been part of the problem. Boston picked up the win, which makes life more difficult for the Mariners, as their slim lead over the A’s in the AL West shrunk another game.

Trei Cruz debuted for the Tigers and in the majors on Friday night, and if you don’t know the history there, you might have missed what’s the occasion, considering he didn’t have a hit or walk or even make a play in the field in a 4-3 Detroit win over the White Sox. The reason is that the 28-year-old outfielder is the son of former MLB outfielder José Cruz Jr., a 12-year veteran who played for the Mariners and Blue Jays, among others. And Cruz Jr. is the son of José Cruz Sr., who had his own 19-year career in the bigs primarily with the Astros.

Both were in attendance to see Trei Cruz make it to the majors on Friday night.

Trei Cruz makes this family the fifth in MLB history to have three generations of players in it. The others? The Bells (Gus, Buddy, and brothers David and Mike), the Hairstons (Sam, Jerry, and brothers Jerry Jr. and Scott), the Boones (Ray, Bob, and brothers Bret and Aaron) and the Colemans (Joe, Joe and Casey).