A’s romp past Jays for season sweep

OAKLAND, Calif. — Sean Manaea pitched effectively into the seventh inning, Jonathan Lucroy drove in four runs and the Oakland Athletics completed a season sweep of Toronto, beating the Toronto Blue Jays 8-3 on Wednesday.

The A’s won all seven games between the two teams this year for their first season sweep of the Blue Jays.

Franklin Barreto homered and had three RBIs for the Athletics. Lucroy added three hits. Russell Martin homered for Toronto. Manaea (10-7) bounced back from a shaky outing in Colorado and allowed one run while frequently pitching through traffic. He gave up five hits, struck out five and walked two.

Toronto starter Marcus Stroman (4-8) allowed seven runs and 11 hits in five innings.

Oakland backed Manaea with plenty of offence, most of it supplied from the bottom half of the lineup. The final five A’s batters combined for 11 hits and drove in seven runs.

Lucroy, the No. 8 hitter, had a two-run single in the second, an RBI double in the fourth and an RBI single in the sixth.

Blue Jays infielder Lourdes Gurriel Jr. was put on the disabled list with a high ankle sprain and bruised knee. Pitcher Danny Barnes was activated after spending more than a month on the disabled list with left knee tendinitis.

Astros 8 Mariners 3: Marwin Gonzalez hit two of Houston’s four home runs, and the visiting Astros knocked the Seattle Mariners from the lead for the second wild card in the American League with an 8-3 win.

After a five-game losing streak, the Astros rebounded to win the final two games of the series. Houston has a five-game cushion over Seattle in the AL West and dropped the Mariners into a tie with surging Oakland for the second AL wild-card spot. Seattle led the A’s by 11 games in the middle of June, but has seen the entire lead disappear over the past six weeks.

Gonzalez hit a solo home run off Wade LeBlanc (6-2) with two outs in the second inning and added a two-run shot in the fourth. Jake Marisnick, recalled from the minors before the game, added a two-run shot off LeBlanc and Max Stassi greeted reliever Nick Vincent with a three-run homer in the fifth to break the game open.

Gonzalez had the third multihomer game of his career after not hitting a longball since June 27 against Toronto.

LeBlanc’s outing was his worst of the season and he seven earned runs were the second-most allowed in his career as a starter and the three homers matched a career high.