Young Laureano joins elite A’s power club
He blasts two solo home runs to eclipse McGwire, Canseco
OAKLAND >> Ramon Laureano has made his presence felt with the A’s ever since he was recalled by the club in the first week of August.
Hitting leadoff for the second straight game Friday, Laureano has taken things to another level.
Laureano hit two solo home runs — including one to lead off the game — and Marcus Semien added a two-run shot to help give the A’s an 8-4 win over the Texas Rangers before a crowd of 15,572 at the Coliseum.
Laureano also hit leadoff Wednesday against the New York Yankees, doubled twice and scored twice in an 8-2 A’s win.
“He’s swinging the bat really well,” A’s manager Bob Melvin said. “He hits one out to left, one out to right. He’s on a roll right now. When guys are swinging well, we try to get them up there as far as we can.”
Laureano’s second home run Friday not only put the A’s up
6-2 in the sixth, but added a rather unique feather to his cap.
Laureano is the first player in A’s history to have two multi-homer games within the first 30 games of his major league career. He also hit two home runs against the Rangers on Aug. 20, and now has five for the season.
Only two other A’s have had two multi-homer games within the first 50 games of their big league careers: Jose Canseco had two in his first 42 games, and Mark McGwire had two by his 43rd game.
“It’s pretty cool,” Laureano said of setting a new franchise mark. “I just want to keep moving forward. All of those kinds of accolades.”
The A’s need a few things to break their way if they hope to catch Houston for first place in the American League West. With no head-to-head meetings left between the two teams, Oakland only controls so much.
Houston won its sixth straight Friday, beating Boston 6-3 to remain 3 ½ games up on the A’s. The Yankees are also 3 ½ games up on Oakland in the race for the first AL wild-card spot.
After the A’s series with the Rangers concludes Sunday, only six of the A’s remaining 18 games are against teams with records above .500.
“To catch Houston or to catch New York, we’ve basically got to win every game,” said Chris Bassitt, who pitched three innings and allowed a tworun homer to Joey Gallo in the fourth. “Maybe the schedule favors us a little bit, but at the same time, with how good Houston is, how good New York is, how good all of those teams are, you’ve got to win every single game.”
Liam Hendriks started for the A’s in another bullpen game, which basically went according to plan. Hendriks made his third straight start in the A’s bullpen experiment, throwing 20 pitches and allowing one walk in one inning.
Along with Hendriks and Bassitt, Yusmeiro Petit, Fernando Rodney, Ryan Buchter, Jeurys Familia and Blake Treinen also pitched for Oakland, with Petit getting the win.
“It’s different,” said Hendriks, who made 34 starts from 2011-2014 with Minnesota, Toronto and Kansas City. “I don’t have my
pregame routine. I’ve been built to throw almost every day. Now it’s just trying to find a good blend of being prepared but also getting prepared in case anything happens.
“It’s weird. It’s like I’m a hybrid right now. Ready to pitch at the start of the game and ready to pitch at the end of the game.”
• Brett Anderson will pitch in a simulated game Saturday and if all goes well, could start for the A’s at some point during next week’s six-game trip through Baltimore and Tampa Bay, Melvin said.
Even if Anderson comes back to pitch on the road
trip, could the A’s continue to use relievers, namely Hendriks, to start games?
“It just depends on which days we want to do that,” Melvin said. “We haven’t really thought about if he comes back, whether or not we do it ahead of him. So, we’ll see.”
• The odds of Sean Manaea pitching again this season remain bleak, and Andrew Triggs is being shut down for the foreseeable future. Manaea’s been on the disabled list since Aug. 26 with a left shoulder impingement. Melvin said Manaea’s injury hasn’t improved enough
to for him to start throwing again.
“He’s going to have a tough time coming back,” Melvin said.
Triggs threw 34 pitches over 1 2/3 innings for Class A Stockton on Wednesday. But Melvin said Triggs, on the DL with right arm nerve irritation since May 18, started “to get some symptoms like he did before, so we’ll have to shut him down and figure out where we go from there, too.”
While it was unlikely that Triggs could start for the A’s again this season, he could come back to be another option in the bullpen. Triggs was 3-1 with a 5.23 ERA in nine starts before landing on the DL.