A's Have Lost 19 of Past 20

The Athletics have lost yet again to the Minnesota Twins. This time, in blowout fashion. The A's offense was able to score three runs, but the A's pitching staff allowed yet another ten-plus run game.

The A's elected to have reliever Grant Holman serve as the team's opener for tonight's contest. Holman tossed a three-up, three-down top of the first inning with three flyouts to centerfielder Denzel Clarke. Kotsay then allowed Holman to go out to start the second inning, and after recording an out, he allowed a pair of baserunners. That led to starter Jacob Lopez entering the contest.

Upon entering the game, Jacob Lopez would strike out Brooks Lee, and then get Royce Lewis to fly out to escape the one-out jam.

Back in the bottom of the first, the A's would open up the scoring with an RBI single scoring Lawrence Butler. In the third, Shea Langeliers would hit a sacrifice fly to score Tyler Soderstrom, and give the A's a 2-0 lead.

In the top of the fourth, Willi Castro would hit his first home run of the night off Jacob Lopez and cut the A's lead to just one. In the sixth, Trevor Larnach would also join the barrel party with a long ball of his own, which tied the game at 2-2. A couple of batters later, Castro would hit yet another home run, giving himself a multi-homer night, the third of his career, against Jacob Lopez.

Brooks Lee would reach on an infield hit, and Lopez would walk Royce Lewis, which caused the skipper Mark Kotsay to turn to the bullpen, sort of. He went with former starter Osvaldo Bido with two on and two out, in what felt like a game-determining inning in the moment.

Bido would deal a four-pitch walk to Harrison Bader, the nine hitter, and end up having to face Byron Buxton. Buxton would end up hitting in a pair of runs to give Minnesota a 5-2 lead. Although Jacob Lopez allowed three solo home runs, he was able to punch out nine Twins hitters, a new career high.

The A's would respond to the Twins' big sixth inning, as in the bottom of the same inning, Shea Langeliers led off the frame with a double to right-center. JJ Bleday followed that up with a productive groundout to move him to third, and Luis Urias would also ground out to score Langeliers.

Just like the top of the sixth, the top of the seventh would consist of the A's allowing another four-run inning. Bido would allow a couple of runners on base, and they turned to Tyler Ferguson, who would blow the game open. He'd hit Brooks Lee to score a run, gave up a two-RBI double to Royce Lewis, and allowed Lee to score on a wild pitch. This would give Minnesota a commanding 9-3 lead after seven.

Elvis Alvarado would come on, trying to keep the score as it was in the eighth inning, but would allow yet another run to Minnesota thanks to Carlos Correa driving in Ryan Jeffers on a ground out. The A's pitching staff has had its troubles recently, and this run made it five of their last eight games, giving up ten or more runs.

The A's look to snap their eight-game losing streak against Minnesota's 25-year-old starter Zebby Matthews. He currently holds a 6.43 ERA in 14 innings pitched for the Twins so far this season.