Cooked Moose Gives A's A Sweep Of One-Run Games!

It didn't come easy today for the A's or for A.J. Griffin, as the Royals put up picket fences in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th. In the 3rd, Griffin walked Chris Getz (on a strike, but we won't bother to be bitter because the A's won) and Getz came around to score (on an Alex Gordon hit, one of 4 he had today). In the 4th, Griffin walked Hosmer leading off, and Hosmer came around to score (on a single by Getz, who had two hits and a walk today despite generally being terrible with a bat in his hand).

In the 5th, after the A's closed the gap to 2-1 on singles by Cespedes and Moss and a Donaldson sac fly, Gordon and Butler singled, and then Eric Hosmer doubled home a run to make it 3-1. 2B and 3B, one out, and that's when Griffin channeled his inner-Milone, popping up Moustakas, and getting Jeff Francouer on a bouncer to 3B.

Oakland got to within a run, 3-2, in the 5th when Eric Sogard doubled and Jed Lowrie, whose searing line drives kept finding gloves, blooped a two out single to RF. Then after Hideki Okajima made a successful A's debut with a scoreless top of the 7th, the A's tied it in the bottom half with some help not from on high, but rather from on Lough.

Leading off, Derek Norris ripped a single to CF and as David Lough came in and then laid back to play it on a hop, he let the ball play him and watched in horror as the ball missed his glove and scooted on by all the way to the CF wall. We call this "doing a Hamilton". Lough had to retrieve it, and Norris wound up at 3B, where pinch hitter Adam Rosales couldn't get him home with a short fly ball to RF, but Coco Crisp could with a fly ball to left-center.

3-3 going to the 8th, where Jerry Blevins tossed a scoreless inning. Neither Sean Doolittle nor Grant Balfour was available today, so Blevins had the 8th and Cook the 9th. Yoenis Cespedes made sure it would be a save situation for Cook in the 9th. He made sure by greeting Kelvim Herrera with a booming HR to left-center field, clearing the wall by at least 3 Angel Hernandez's (a measurement of how far beyond an actual HR a HR needs to go not to be forsaken). It also cleared by at least 2 Altuves.

That gave the A's a 4-3 lead for Cook, and the A's back-up closer got the first 2 outs before Billy Butler singled, Hosmer singled pinch runner Elliot Johnson to 3B, Hosmer stole 2B representing the go-ahead run, and that's when the Cooked Moose was served. Moustakas was 0-for-the-series and something like 1 for 25 on the Royals' road trip. He's no Chris Getz.

The A's outscored Kansas City all of 8-5 in the series, and had to come from behind each game. On to Texas!