Too Much Time Wasted Watching a Loss

For the second time in a week, A's fans were subjected to a slow, long, meandering game. For the second time in a week it was all for naught as the A's fell to the Rangers in Arlington tonight 7-6. The game started off well for the A's when Josh Reddick got his 18th home run of the year off of Rangers starter Scott Feldman. But it didn't take particularly long for that lead to evaporate as the Rangers would tie it up in the bottom half.

In the top of the third, the A's came back with Derek Norris launching a liner to left field for his second home run of the year to give Oakland the 2-1 lead. Cliff Pennington made it back-to-back home runs as he snuck it right in front of the foul pole for a home run and a 3-1 lead. It looked like this were clicking on all six cylinders, as the A's would tack on another run in the inning to give themselves a 4-1 lead. But the Rangers would not let up, and would get one run back in the bottom half.

In the fifth inning the wheels finally came off for A's starter Tyson Ross. He walked lead off man Leonys Martin, who stole second and moved to third on an Ian Kinsler single. Kinsler stole second with Elvis Andrus up and then scored another run as Andrus hit one into the hole that Weeks couldn't get over to first on line for an infield hit. This prompted Bob Melvin to come out and get Jim Miller, not necessarily the guy I'd choose in that situation but he was the guy chosen and he promptly walked Josh Hamilton to load the bases and Elvis Andrus to score the tying run. After threading the needle and getting two outs, David Murphy gave Texas a lead they would not relinquish with a single to right field that scored two. The Rangers would tack on an insurance run in the seventh.

Oakland didn't give up scoring two more runs in the top of the seventh, but alas it was no enough and they succumbed to the Texas heat and the Texas hitters. Cespedes, Crisp and Norris were your stars in this one. Crisp in particular made an incredible play to double off a runner. Who knew he could make great plays with his arm? A's do it all again tomorrow.