A few days ago, Athletics manager Mark Kotsay said that his team is a power-hitting, not base stealing group when asked why he has slugging first baseman Nick Kurtz hitting leadoff. That was the case last year and will be again this year, evident by the 29 home runs the team has already hit this spring. This afternoon, the A\u2019s powerful offense led the way, blasting five home runs in a 13-3 pummeling of the Arizona Diamondbacks.<\/p>\n
The Diamondbacks scored first as A\u2019s starting pitcher Luis Morales gave up a home run to the second batter he faced, second baseman Ildemaro Vargas. The A\u2019s responded right away as their second baseman Andy Ib\u00e1\u00f1ez hit his first home run in an A\u2019s uniform, a two-run blast off Arizona\u2019s pitcher Ryne Nelson in the top of the second inning.<\/p>\n
Arizona continued the back-and-forth nature of the game\u2019s early going by tying the game at two in the bottom of that inning, their rally aided by A\u2019s third baseman Max Muncy\u2019s third error of spring training.<\/p>\n
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The A\u2019s took the lead for good the following inning courtesy of Shea Langeliers\u2019 third Cactus League home run, a solo shot to left field. Muncy added a solo home run in the fourth inning, redeeming himself from the error he committed earlier in the game.<\/p>\n
Muncy, who got three hits plus a walk, looks ready for Opening Day offensively. However, the natural shortstop\u2019s defense at third base continues to be erratic. He will need to clean things up before the season, or his defensive mistakes could cost the A\u2019s games this year.<\/p>\n
Up by two through four innings, the A\u2019s broke this game open by scoring five runs against Diamondbacks reliever Thomas Hatch in the fifth inning. Brent Rooker immediately followed Tyler Soderstrom\u2019s three-run home run with a solo shot of his own.<\/p>\n
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Meanwhile, Morales settled down, turning in his best start of the spring so far. He allowed two runs \u2014 one unearned \u2014 over 4 2\/3 innings while working in and out of trouble. In the second inning, he got Anderdson Rojas to ground into an inning-ending double play with runners on second and third and one out. The next inning, Arizona loaded the bases with one out before Morales struck out the next two batters to escape the jam and finished the day reaching 75 pitches. He should be well almost fully stretched out with just a couple weeks to go until Opening Day.<\/p>\n
The A\u2019s reserves added on late, scoring two runs in the seventh and eighth innings to make the game even more of a blowout. Today, the team went far down its bench, giving playing time to Carlos Pacheco, Breyson Guedez and Jose Ramos, three recent international signees who are much further away from MLB than the team\u2019s top prospect Leo De Vries.<\/p>\n
Unlike the past few games in which A\u2019s relievers allowed the other team to make a comeback, they were nearly perfect this afternoon. Justin Sterner, Hogan Harris and non-roster invitee Nick Anderson all threw scoreless innings to wrap up a big win for the A\u2019s. And now they\u2019re rolling.<\/p>\n
The Athletics will look to make it six wins in a row tomorrow at the Texas Rangers. Right-hander J.T. Ginn will make his fourth start of the spring, while the Rangers have yet to announce their scheduled starter for that game. Ginn allowed four runs, including two home runs, over three innings in his last outing against the Colorado Rockies. Look for Ginn to pitch better tomorrow as he vies for a spot on the A\u2019s Opening Day rotation or bullpen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A few days ago, Athletics manager Mark Kotsay said that his team is a power-hitting, not base stealing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":619392,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[3806,22,537,5,545,52,4813,16566,631,6616,706,4215,1532,4,459,5938,5889,3442,69,20316,544],"class_list":{"0":"post-619391","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-andy-ibanez","9":"tag-arizona-diamondbacks","10":"tag-athletics","11":"tag-baseball","12":"tag-brent-rooker","13":"tag-colorado-rockies","14":"tag-hogan-harris","15":"tag-ildemaro-vargas","16":"tag-j-t-ginn","17":"tag-justin-sterner","18":"tag-luis-morales","19":"tag-mark-kotsay","20":"tag-max-muncy","21":"tag-mlb","22":"tag-nick-kurtz","23":"tag-ryne-nelson","24":"tag-second-inning","25":"tag-shea-langeliers","26":"tag-texas-rangers","27":"tag-thomas-hatch","28":"tag-tyler-soderstrom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116213587811006008","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619391","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=619391"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619391\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/619392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=619391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=619391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=619391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}