Stolen bases are seen as boost for offense

DETROIT — Amid the Oakland Athletics’ scoring struggles, their offense has been efficient in one area: the basepaths.

The A’s entered Wednesday tied for fifth in the majors with 19 stolen bases in 22 attempts. Their 86% success rate ranked second among teams with at least 20 tries.

“We’ve been able to pick our spots,” manager Mark Kotsay said. “We know we need to create a little offense when we’re not tearing the cover off the baseball.”

Game 2 of Tuesday’s doubleheader offered an example. The A’s hadn’t scored in the first 12 innings of the twinbill when Sheldon Neuse singled, stole second and took third on Detroit catcher Eric Haase’s throwing error. Jed Lowrie lined the next pitch to right field, deep enough to score Neuse.

Neuse leads the A’s with four steals in five tries. He had one in 58 games in the majors before this year.

“Most of it has come from the bench,” Neuse said. “It’s just kind of reading the game. I know I’m not a guy that’s going to get paid a lot of attention to, anyway, but you don’t have to be an 80-grade speed to steal bases. You just have to be able to get off far enough that you can get back and get good jumps.”

The A’s were 3-for-4 in steals attempts in Tuesday’s second game; Cristian Pache was picked off leaving first base as the exception. Haase erred on two throws that gave runners an 90 extra feet. In the seventh, Kevin Smith singled, stole second, took third on a groundout and scored on a single by Pache.

“Our coaches are doing a great job of kind of scouting other teams and what counts are better to run in and just giving us the green light in really good situations,” Smith said. “I think it’s a matter of staying in that realm of trying to pick really good spots instead of trying to steal every time you’re out there.”

Neuse noted some of his tries have come in counts on which the pitcher might be likelier to work outside the strike zone, making it tougher for the catcher to throw. Neuse ran on a 3-1 count Tuesday and said he was “just kind of getting in motion” with Lowrie at the plate.

The A’s entered Wednesday averaging 3.29 runs per game, third-lowest in the majors. They’d totaled the fewest baserunners with a batter at the plate — but their 15.4% rate of driving in those baserunners was sixth-highest, indicating their scoring woes more reflect lack of chances.

“Offense is down around the league, so it’s like how can we manufacture as many runs as we can and give our pitchers an opportunity to be successful?” Smith said. “We’re trying to do whatever we can to get runs and to put some pressure on the defense.”

Not a heavy running team for much of the past decade, the A’s ranked seventh in the majors in steals (88) in 2021 and third in success rate (81%).

“We’re looking at all factors, and if they align in our favor, we feel like we can be aggressive when we need to be aggressive,” Kotsay said.

Briefly: Adrián Martínez, the A’s 27th man for Tuesday’s doubleheader, was returned to Triple-A after throwing 51⁄3 scoreless innings and earning the win in his major-league debut. … Kotsay said he texted with former Oakland manager Bob Melvin, who had prostate surgery Wednesday. “Haven’t heard how the surgery went yet,” Kotsay said pregame, “but we definitely are thinking about Bob.”