By the time the A's finished bombing two 3-run HRs and another two solo HRs, it was hard to remember that for a while it looked like the offense was in "create mode."
Down 1-0 the A's got even in the 3rd against Rick Porcello when Cliff Pennington singled, alertly and daringly tagged up on a medium-deep fly ball to left-center field, then got a great read and scored on a soft one-hopper to RF by Rajai Davis. Exciting, resourceful, good baseball to be sure...But there must be an easier way...
Enter Jack Cust, exit baseball. Cust's 3-run bomb to left-center capped off a 4-run bottom of the 3rd, which Brett Tomko held through his 6 solid innings of 1-run ball. Meanwhile, Cust HRed again as part of his perfect 3-3, 1 BB, 2 HR, 4 RBI day.
The Tigers would rally against the A's bullpen, nicking Brad Ziegler for a run in the 7th, and two more off of Michael Wuertz in the 8th courtesy of Miguel Cabrera's 200th career wap-a-pap (note the all lowercase for an opposing hitter).
So it was 5-4 A's going to the bottom of the 8th, until Big Green & Little Gold found a lovely spot just inside the right-field foul pole. First it was Landon Powell with a 3-run HR off Ryan Perry, and then two batters later it was Cliff Pennington keeping it just fair off of said Perry.
4 HRs, tying the A's season-high, accounting for 8 of the 9 runs -- and a win that sends the Tigers away having lost their 11th consecutive series on the road, and that pulls the A's to within 19.5 games of first place. Well it does.
