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A's fall short in Cleveland, 5-4
By Morris Phillips July 3, 2010 |
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The second half of the 2010 season began with another reminder that the resourceful, resilient A’s have become the team that comes up a little short. Cleveland’s Matt LaPorta delivered a seeing-eye chopper up the middle in the tenth inning to score Anderson Hernandez and send the Indians past the A’s, 5-4, in 10 innings. The loss was Oakland’s sixth in their last nine one-run decisions, and it short circuited the team’s attempt to quickly regain a foothold on their season by getting back to .500 with wins in seven of their last eight games. Instead the A’s fell to 40-42 and nine games off the pace of AL West leader Texas. Winning one-run games had been the A’s way of getting the most out of a little in April and May, as they took 10 of their first 12 one-run decisions while holding on to first place in the division. But in losing 16 of their first 22 games in June, the A’s faltered late, first with shoddy bullpen work and then with a punchless offense that did little late in ballgames. Against Cleveland, the A’s survived a shaky start from Clayton Mortensen, who parlayed his stellar pitching at Triple AAA Sacramento into another big league audition with the A’s. Mortensen took Dallas Braden’s place in the rotation, after Braden was put on the disabled list earlier in the day to rehab his balky elbow. Mortensen was touched early, by Cleveland’s Jason Nix, who sent the lanky right hander’s elevated offering over the left field wall for a 2-0 Indians’ lead. The A’s responded in the third with three runs, highlighted by Cliff Pennington’s two-run triple, to take a lead, but then the offense disappeared, managing just one run over the final seven innings. Oakland mounted its best threat in the tenth, when Ryan Sweeney doubled with one out. But Indians’ reliever Tony Sipp retired Jack Cust on a fly ball and got Adam Rosales to ground out to end the threat. Sipp’s clutch pitching set up Cleveland’s winning rally in the bottom half of that inning. Travis Hafner doubled off of Craig Breslow with one out, and Hernandez pinch ran for Hafner. Austin Kearns was then intentionally walked, and that allowed Breslow to go after Jhonny Peralta, who was retired on a fly ball for the second out. But LaPorta, who’s getting a chance to make good on his considerable promise with the trade of Russell Branyan to Seattle, came through with a chopper up the middle to end it. “He threw the ball well,” manager Bob Geren said of Breslow. “He gave up a chopper up the middle. If that ball was two feet either way, it’s to the shortstop or second basemen.” Oakland concludes its road trip Sunday with Fausto Carmona of the Indians facing Oakland’s Vin Mazzaro. |
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