The Athletics gave themselves a chance to steal this one late, but the damage was already done. Detroit’s early power surge and another shaky outing from Jack Perkins left too much ground to make up, and the Tigers held on for an 8-6 win that sent the A’s to their fourth straight loss.
Perkins was tagged right away. Kevin McGonigle opened the game by launching his 11th homer of the season, a solo shot to left, and three singles later Detroit had added a second run before the A’s could settle in. From there, the game turned into a familiar story: the A’s kept putting traffic on the bases, but Framber Valdez kept finding a way out of trouble.
The A’s had chances in the first and second innings and came up empty both times. Tyler Soderstrom and Tommy White strung together back-to-back two-out singles in the first, only for Lawrence Butler to be retired. In the second, Alika Williams singled and Henry Bolte walked, but Valdez again escaped, getting help from his middle infield on a slick double play.
The breakthrough finally came in the third. Jacob Wilson and White singled to set the table, and Butler came through with an RBI single to bring home Wilson and trim Detroit’s lead to 2-1. Perkins then briefly stabilized, stringing together three scoreless innings and giving the A’s a path back.
That path got a little wider in the fourth. Bolte led off with a ground-rule double to right, and the A’s used hustle to tie it up. Jonathan Ornelas beat out a bunt single, then Wilson reached on an RBI force out when he outran the double-play relay, sending Bolte home to make it 2-2.
But Detroit answered fast, and it answered with power. Gleyber Torres launched a two-run homer to right-center in the fifth, putting the Tigers back in front. Then in the sixth, Max Clark, playing in his second MLB game, hit his first career homer, another two-run shot that pushed the lead to 6-2.
Perkins finished with six runs allowed on nine hits over 5 1/3 innings. He struck out nine, but the three homers were the killer.
The stuff was there. The margin for error wasn’t.
Valdez kept rolling on the other side. He allowed two runs over seven innings, struck out six, and leaned on his sinker to pile up ten groundouts. More importantly for Detroit, he strung together three scoreless innings after the Tigers retook the lead and never really let the A’s back in the game.
Detroit added insurance in the seventh and eighth. Spencer Torkelson singled in a run in the seventh against Scott Blewett, and the Tigers scored again in the eighth for their fourth straight inning with a run. A’s defense didn’t help much either, with White missing a play at third that should have ended the seventh.
Still, the A’s weren’t done. In the eighth, Bolte crushed his third hit of the night, a three-run homer to center off Kyle Finnegan, cutting the deficit to 8-5. White finished with three hits as well, a bright spot in a game full of missed chances.
The rally kept breathing for a moment after that. The A’s put two more runners aboard, but Jacob Waguespack shut the door before they could get any closer. Wilson’s night ended with another chase below the strike zone, this time for strike three, and the inning slipped away.
Detroit closer Kenley Jansen came in to handle the save situation, and the A’s managed one more run when Soderstrom, after a leadoff double, scored on Jeff McNeil’s two-out RBI bunt single. That was the final push. It wasn’t enough.
The A’s finished with 15 hits and went 5-for-19 with runners in scoring position. They also grounded into two more double plays, pushing their season total to an MLB-leading 86. In a game where the offense produced enough traffic to matter, the pitching staff’s stretch of unanswered runs proved too much to overcome.
Now the Athletics are still looking for their first series win since that successful week at their Triple-A affiliate’s ballpark. They’ll try to avoid a sweep in the homestand finale Sunday afternoon, when rookie left-hander Gage Jump is set to face Tigers right-hander Keider Montero.
In Other News...
Jack Perkins Is Forcing An Athletics Rotation Question Late This Season
With the season winding down, Mark Kotsay is using these last weeks to take a longer look at young Athletics pitchers, and Jack Perkins has pushed himself into the conversation. The right-hander has shown enough progress to make this stretch matter beyond the standings, because Oakland is still sorting out what its future rotation could look like and who belongs in it.
Perkins added another layer to that case in a recent outing against the Tigers, where he gave up three home runs but also struck out a career-high nine over 5 1/3 innings. The mixed line fits the broader evaluation Kotsay is trying to conduct, and Perkins has made it clear he sees himself as part of the clubs rotation picture down the road, even if the exact timeline still leaves room for questions. [Read more 🡒]
As Rotation Plans May Depend On One Royals Deadline Decision
With Shea Langeliers and Brent Rooker now expected to miss the rest of the season, the Athletics are already looking past the immediate pain and into how they can build a sturdier roster for next year. Pitching is a clear part of that conversation, and the Royals have become a team Oakland has to watch closely as the deadline approaches. Kansas City has already moved Lane Thomas, a sign it may be willing to keep reshaping the roster rather than standing pat.
One path for the A's could open if the Royals decide to push their retooling further, because the market for available arms often shifts quickly once a team starts dealing from the top of its staff. Oakland has shown interest in pitchers such as Kris Bubic and Seth Lugo, which puts it on the lookout for rotation help whenever a seller or a semi-seller gets serious. For a club trying to recover from a brutal stretch of injuries, the next move in Kansas City could end up mattering more than it first appears. [Read more 🡒]