Piscotty, Lowrie get to Padres
Later homers off bullpen aces rally A’s to win in 10 innings
SAN DIEGO >> It took the Padres bringing in their best pitcher, but the A’s offense finally broke through.
Jed Lowrie provided the pivotal blow in the 10th inning with a two-run shot to right field off Adam Cimber to put the A’s ahead by two runs for the eventual 4-2 win Tuesday night, but that would not have been possible had it not been for the heroics by Stephen Piscotty an inning before.
Facing Brad Hand, the closer who is likely to represent the Padres at this year’s All-Star game, Piscotty was down to his final strike.
After Hand leaned over the rubber a good while and figured out what to throw, Piscotty appeared to guess right on the pitch he wanted, launching a 2-2 fastball well up the bleachers in left field for a no-doubt solo home run to tie the game with two outs in the top of the ninth.
“Going into that at-bat you know you’re probably only going to get one good pitch to hit and you don’t want to miss it,” Pis-
cotty said. “He did a good job getting ahead, but in my mind I was just waiting for that one, and luckily I got it and didn’t miss it.”
Piscotty felt like he made up for a golden opportunity in the second that dissolved quickly. The A’s had Padres (34-41) starter Eric Lauer on the ropes, loading the bases with no outs. Piscotty came up and grounded into a double play, which brought home a run, but limited the A’s to just one run in the inning.
Hand had converted his past 15 saves opportunities entering the night. But despite that was not so impressive for Piscotty, who was already 4 for 6 for his career with a double against the right-hander, making him the perfect man for the situation.
“If there’s someone you want up against him based on his numbers, it’s him,” A’s manager Bob Melvin said. “We really didn’t do
anything offensively, and for the most part, neither did they. Next thing you know we tie it up and hit two homers, which typically we do when we win.”
The home run sent the A’s (37-36) dugout, as well as the large portion of A’s fans who had invaded Petco Park, into a frenzy.
The energy carried over to Blake Treinen, who held the Padres scoreless in the 10th to convert his 13th consecutive save opportunity and 16th save overall.
“That’s about as big a momentum shift as you’re gonna get,” Melvin said. “You’re a strike away from losing and then all of a sudden now you potentially have their closer out of the game and you feel like bullpen-wise, we’re maybe a little more set.”
Treinen capped off what was another great outing from the entire bullpen.
Emilio Pagan, Santiago Casilla, Lou Trivino and Treinen combined for five scoreless innings, allowing just two hits and one walk with ten strikeouts.
After following up a terrific
start with the worst of his career, Paul Blackburn’s third start back from the disabled list was somewhere in the middle.
The right-hander did his best to keep the A’s in the game, allowing just two runs on four hits and two walks with four strikeouts before departing after five innings.
Blackburn was able to find his rhythm after a shaky first two innings, something he was unable to do in his previous start when he lasted just over an inning as he was rocked by the Houston Astros.
“Going from a real bad start, those four days in there you just want to get back out there and you feel like they take forever,” Blackburn said. “I was glad to get back out there and throw that start in the past and work off this one.”
Khris Davis nearly gave the A’s the lead with a runner on in the eighth as he crushed a pitch from Kirby Yates deep to right field that would have probably gone out at any other ballpark and put the A’s ahead 3-2. But at Petco Park, it was just a fly out to the wall to end the inning.
“I was shocked. We’ve seen him hit that ball so many times and it’s a homer almost every single time,” Melvin said. “Off the bat, there was no doubt in my mind that was a homer.”
• Third baseman Matt Chapman received a shot Monday, this time with both cortisone and saline near the base of his right thumb. There’s no timetable for his return.