A’s continue to sink, swept by Toronto
An 8-0 loss Sunday in Toronto did all sorts of things to the A’s, none of them good. Being swept by the Blue Jays was the least of it.
The A’s (74-63) fell two more spots in the wildcard race and now trail four teams, 41/2 games behind the Yankees and four back of Boston. They fell to third place in the A.L. West, behind Seattle, six games back of Houston.
With 25 games to play, the A’s need to get themselves together quickly. Doing so won’t be easy with the AL Central-leading Chicago White Sox coming to Oakland for three games, starting Tuesday. Only six of the 25 games are against teams with losing records. On the plus side, the A’s will have six shots against Houston and seven against Seattle.
“We’ll be playing very meaningful games probably until the last out of season,” third baseman Matt Chapman said.
The A’s have lost 12 of 18 games since Chris Bassitt’s injury Aug. 17 in Chicago. They also have been playing without Ramon Laureano, who was handed an 80-game suspension Aug. 6 for PED use.
Since Aug. 20, the A’s team ERA ranks third-to-last in the Majors. And over the course of their last 10 games, the A’s have blown four leads of six or more runs.
“Pitching has been solid
for us all season,” Chapman said, “and we win as a team and lose as a team.”
Sunday’s starter, Cole Irvin, lasted just 2.2 innings. After retiring Toronto on eight pitches in the first inning, Irvin surrendered a two-run triple to Lourdes Gurriel and an RBI double to Randall Grichuk in the second. In the third, he gave up a home run to Marcus Semien, who beat his former team in the series opener
with a three-run walk-off blast.
Irvin (9-13, 4.10 ERA) gave up three more hits, the last of them a three-run homer by Toronto catcher Alejandro Kirk. The seven earned runs were the most he has allowed since May 22, 2019 when he pitched for Philadelphia.
“I think it’s a combination of being up in the zone, probably too many balls in the middle of the plate, and a really good hot-hitting team
right now,” A’s manager Bob Melvin said. “They got on him early. I’ve said a lot of time with a starter you can get him early and get him on the run and that’s what they did to him.”
Irvin’s performance stood in stark contrast to his last encounter with the Blue Jays, a 4-1 victory in which the
lefthander allowed one run over eight innings and set a career-high with nine strikeouts. Then again, that was on
May 4.
Asked the difference between that outing and this one, besides five months, Irvin said the answer was clear.
“I was thigh high across ( Sunday),” he said. “I wasn’t executing down at the bottom of the zone and I wasn’t extending my changeup horizontally. Just pretty straightforward, I’m mixing pitches in and out but when it’s thigh line across and I’m not giving them any look up and down, I’m going to get hit hard. That’s been the tale of the tape the past few outings.”
The A’s struggles on the mound were matched by a cold day at the plate against Toronto ace Robbie Ray, a Cy Young candidate who ranks second in the majors in strikeouts and sixth in ERA.
Ray, a lefty who relies on just a fastball and slider, didn’t allow a hit until the fifth inning and struck out 10 over the course of 6.2 shutout innings. Oakland DH Khris Davis recorded his team’s lone hit against Ray, a fifthinning double to left field.
“He throws that fastball that’s not really too high that you can lay off it, it looks pretty good and it’s got some jump to it at the end,” Melvin said. “Then when he throws that backdoor slider that kind of looks like a fastball away and down, then it just kind of drops. It’s a little unorthodox how he does it.”
Even when Ray’s pitch count forced him from the game in the seventh inning, the Blue Jays staff continued to dominate the way he did. The A’s finished the game with just two hits.
“We’ve just got to have a short memory on that one,” Chapman said.
Melvin sounded a hopeful note.
“I think the best part of our season is yet to come,” he said. “I really do. I think we’re going to get home and play our best stretch of baseball. I think we’re going to get on a run before this season’s over.”