When you do everything right, you deserve to win. All the things that make a team unpredictably good, the A's did tonight and ultimately it paid off in spades. Swisher tagging up from first base on a foul pop-up to third base--that's good baseball. Kendall stealing second, avoiding a DP and scoring on Swisher's homerun--who says you can't run and hit for power? And finally, Frank Thomas, on a 3-0 pitch that Scot Shields, and everyone who has followed the A's for years, knew full well that Thomas was taking. Gone.
And while Ken Macha didn't always wind up looking good--titanic homerun after titanic homerun off your starter has a way of doing that--his decision to walk Garret Anderson with nobody out was a winner, as was his faith in the oft-wild Chad Gaudin to pitch with the bases loaded.
The A's played a really good baseball game tonight and tonight, baseball karma rewarded them with a win. That was first place baseball, folks.
