A’s smacked by Rangers 15-2

Nothing went right today

The A’s got hit hard today as they lost to the Rangers 15-2, losing the second game of this four-game set.

On the bump for the visiting team was left-hander Jacob Lopez. Acquired in the offseason in the same trade that brought Jeffrey Springs to the organization, Lopez was making his first start of the year (and third of his career) for the big league squad after fellow starter JT Ginn went down to injury last week. The 27-year old had already been stretched out in the minor leagues after making a pair of starts down there so the team could reasonably expect some length from the rookie.

Instead Lopez struggled out of the gate against a Rangers offense that has had trouble scoring this year. He managed to avoid giving up any runs in the first despite walking three batters. He wasn’t so lucky in the second as his leadoff walk came around to score for the first run of the game. Texas chased the left-hander out of this game in the third after stringing together four straight singles to plate a pair of runs. Lopez didn’t manage to finish the inning, finishing his day after 2 ²⁄₃ frames and 84 pitches. Not the outing he was hoping for but the team doesn’t have many other alternatives at the moment so he may get another look in the rotation.

The team turned to another left-hander as Hogan Harris came on in relief. A former starter himself, Harris pitched a couple of innings and allowing another Texas run to cross home plate in the fourth that made it 4-0 heading into the bottom of the sixth.

That’s when the wheels really came off for the A’s today. Harris was pulled after a leadoff single and flyout after just 46 pitches. Rule 5 pick Noah Murdock entered the game in relief and imploded. The right-handed rookie allowed seven runs off of four hits and three walks, not even managing to record an out before mercifully getting the hook. Murdock’s season ERA now stands at a shockingly bad 14.79 and one has to think that the team is getting close to ending this experiment with him. At this point it’s almost doing more damage to his psyche to leave him on the roster and it’s not helping the team win games. There were high hopes for him entering the year but sometimes Rule 5 picks don’t work out.

The A’s would not be shut out tonight! After getting dominated and shut out for six innings against Rangers starting pitcher Jacob deGrom the Athletics were finally into the Texas bullpen and got some licks in. Catcher Shea Langeliers made sure of that with his sixth home run of the year, a 2-run shot to get the Green & Gold on the board:

There would be no shut out for the Rangers tonight but that would be all the team could muster against Texas. Righty reliever TJ McFarland relieved Murdock and finished the sixth and seventh. With the score now 12-2 the A’s turned to a position player to pitch the final frame as backup catcher Jhonny Pereda took the hill for the bottom of the eighth. He allowed three runs on three hits and a walk… but also struck out a batter! Get that man his ball.

That wasn’t a great showing from the A’s tonight. The loss snaps the small 2-game winning streak and drops the team back to the .500 mark after having a winning record for just one day. Lopez was shaky at best but Murdock really gave this game away in the sixth when he couldn’t get even one out. We’ll see if the team makes any moves with him.

Tomorrow night will feature right-hander Luis Severino on the mound for the Athletics while Texas will send veteran Nathan Eovaldi for them. Same time, same place, but hopefully a different result!