The ‘other’ KD homers twice to help Montas beat Royals
Davis’ 16th and 17th homers help key 7-2 victory
OAKLAND >> The cheer from the announced crowd of 10,132 began at around 8:30 p.m. Friday when Athletics pitcher Frankie Montas was retiring Mike Moustakas on a fly to center, and gained in volume as Salvador Perez was retired on a foul pop to first.
It increased when public address announcer Dick Callahan announced to the crowd that the Golden State Warriors had won their third NBA championship in four seasons.
There was no discernible reaction on the field, as the Athletics went about their business in a 7-2 win over the Kansas City Royals.
As a packed house next door at an Oracle Arena watch party cheered for Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant and Co., the A’s got power from their own “K.D.” and a stout pitching performance from Montas to improve to 32-31 on the season.
Davis hit solo home runs in the first fourth innings, his 16th and 17th of the season, while Dustin Fowler added a solo shot, his fourth in the third. Jonathan Lucroy added a runscoring single in the third and a two-run double in the sixth inning.
That was more than Montas (3-0) needed, as the right-hander went 7 2/3 innings before being removed after giving up a two-run home run to Moustakas. Montas walked two and struck out five.
Emilio Pagan faced two hitters in the eighth giving up a double and a walk, with Lou Trivino coming in to finish up.
The NBA result made a prophet out of A’s manager Bob Melvin, who in his pregame scrum predicted a Warriors title.
“There’s no doubt they’ll win tonight, and I’m sure we’ll hear the reaction right around 8:30, 8:45 maybe, something like that,” Melvin said.
Davis got the Athletics started with a home run to right center field off Jakob Junis (5-6) on a 1-1 pitch, and the Athletics went up 2-0 in the third on a two-out solo home run by Fowler.
In the fourth, Davis struck again, this time on a 1-2 pitch, a towering fly that cleared the fence in center field. The Athletics weren’t done, as Matt Chapman hit a one-out single, followed by another single by Mar- cus Semien.
Junis struck out Stephen Piscotty, but Jona- than Lucroy hit a seeingeye ground ball single past shortstop to drive in Chapman and make it 4-0.
Lucroy also chased Junis in the sixth inning with a two-run double.
The A’s added a run in the eighth when Semien hit a one-out triple and scored when a chopper by Stephen Piscotty was booted by a charging Alcides Escobar at short. THE SCORE
A’S 7, ROYALS 2
Up next: A’s (Cahill 1-2) vs. Royals (Duffy 2-6), today, 1:05 p.m., NBCCA
• Davis has 102 home runs since the start of the 2016 season, the most in the Major Leagues by one over the Yankees’ Giancarlo Stanton. Davis and Stanton went into Friday’s games with 100 each. Stanton homered in the ninth inning of the Yankees’ 4-1 win over the Mets.
• A season-high seven game errorless streak came to an end in the third inning when shortstop Marcus Semien booted a twoout ground ball from Alcides Escobar.
Semien, however, turned in a gem of a play to end the second inning by spearing a ground ball from Paulo Orlando and getting the third out on a back-handed flip to second for force play.
• Veteran reliever Santiago Casilla was activated from the disabled list after missing 12 games with a right shoulder strain, while Ryan Dull was optioned to Triple-A Nashville.
Casilla, who has 144 saves in 15 seasons with The A’s, Giants and then A’s again, has one save this season and was used by Melvin at different points in the game. He has just one save this year, but a 3.32 earned run average and has the second lowest opponent’s slugging percentage (.194) and sixth lowest batting average (.153) among AL relievers.
• All the analytics that suggested that center fielder Dustin Fowler’s diving catch of a shallow drive Ramon Torres Friday night didn’t tell Melvin anything different than what he witnessed with his own eyes.
“Looking at all those numbers it’s pretty much the way I felt when he made the catch last night,” Melvin said. “It was a good play.”