A's defeat Slegna; Red Jerseys Declared Ugly

Nine frames could not hold these two teams.

After eighteen innings played in the O.co, the Baseball Gods decreed moar baseball was necessary.

It was a scary prospect for an A's team that not only entered the 10th inning a paltry 5-10 in extra innings, but also plays mainly station-to-station baseball (there may be a correlation between these two things).

Things then got a little...weird.  Kind of like after you end up sleeping with that person who's been a friend for a long time and it just kinda makes everything all awkward and weird. Okay, that's an overstatement, but here's how it all went down in the bottom of the tenth:

But when Josh Willingham walked to start the bottom of the tenth inning, certified Slegna killer David DeJesus...bunted pinch-runner Pennington to second. Conor Jackson approached the plate and took eight pitches to weakly ground the ball to third.  The switch-hitting Landon Powell came up with a chance to be the hero with a walk-off and...walked. On a close pitch. Scott Sizemore next came up with a chance to win it for the A's and...HE DID! Ripped it to center field over Mike Trout's head and drove in Pennington to earn the split with Slegna! Woot! A's win in ten! Lawyerball is declared righteous and all is well in the world. 

Please excuse the running narrative of the winning inning as a poor excuse for a recap, but it's been a long day for all of us. Six hours and twenty-two minutes of baseball, according to Ken Korach.

Other than a couple gopher balls, Rich Harden pitched well.  He pitched seven solid, almost matching Trevor Cahill's efforts in the earlier game. Harden pitched seven innings, four hits, three runs, nine strikeouts, two walks.  Cahill pitched seven innings, five hits, three runs, eight strikeouts, five walks.

The bullpen earned their bread in the second game--Grant Balfour, Andrew Bailey and Brad Ziegler (who earned the win) all shut down Anaheim, allowing one hit and no runs in three innings of work.

Of course, none of this may have been necessary if Ryan Sweeney hadn't got caught for the third out trying to turn a double into a triple.  You see what happens, Sweeney? You see what happens when you break baseball's unwritten rules?! If Dallas wasn't in Stockton, signing bobble bellies, he probably would've yelled at you, Swingles.

Positives:

• Harden pitched well.  He gave up a couple of home runs, but other than that, he was money. Lots of K's, low BB's.  Went seven.
• Scott Sizemore broke out of his mini-slump, going two for five and driving in the winning run.
• Eric Sogard baked us all fresh tree cookies!
• As opposed to yesterday, almost all of the pitching in both games was really solid.  The starters and the relievers especially really hunkered down and gave it their all. It's nice to see the team still putting out the effort.
• The A's won the game.  You play, apparently, to win the game.  Or so Herm Edwards says.

The A's managed to win the second game in extra innings. And my duties to AN are done for the day.  Perhaps we should consider what it is to manage a split with the Slegna today. Dare we dream of taking three of four?  We go for the series win tomorrow at 1:05pm and Gio Gonzalez.