One Hit in Seattle, and Gage Jump Deserved a Lot Better Than That

Bryan Woo threw eight innings and gave up a Henry Bolte single, our 23 year old lefty punched out seven in four and got hung with his tenth loss, and the A's lost 2 to 0 without ever putting a runner in scoring position.

Henry Bolte got a single. That's the list. That's every good thing that happened to an A's hitter this afternoon, and I watched all of it.

Bryan Woo threw eight innings and gave up that one knock. Nine strikeouts, two walks, and the only reason it wasn't a complete game is that Seattle wanted to get Muñoz an inning of work in a two run game. We had three baserunners all day. Three. Bolte's single and two walks to Donovan Walton, who came off the bench and wound up being our best offensive player by drawing free passes.

Gage Jump was the best pitcher on our side and he took the loss

Four innings, seven strikeouts, no walks, six hits, two runs. On most afternoons that's a decent start from a 23 year old lefty who has been asked to eat innings on a last place team all year.

He now sits at 6 and 10 with 106 strikeouts in 96 and two thirds, which is the profile of a guy who misses bats and is still learning what to do with the contact he gives up. That's fine. That's what a rookie season looks like. The kid struck out seven of the thirteen outs he recorded and walked nobody, in Seattle, against a lineup with Julio and Raleigh and Arozarena in it.

And the loss goes on his record, because our lineup put up a zero.

The fourth inning was the whole game and it took four minutes

Canzone singles. Julio singles. Raleigh lines one to left and Canzone scores. Then J.P. Crawford grounds one up the middle past Bolte's reach in center and Julio comes home.

That's it. Two runs, none of them hit hard enough to make anybody nervous, and the game was decided before I had finished lunch.

What killed me is what came after. Seth Johnson went two innings and struck out four. Blewett went one. Tur went one. Four scoreless innings out of the bullpen, six punchouts between them, and it was completely meaningless because there was never going to be a run.

Ten strikeouts, zero runners in scoring position

McNeil 0 for 4. Gelof 0 for 4 with two strikeouts. Butler 0 for 3, and he's down to .231 on the year now, which is a hard sentence to type about a guy I spent last winter telling people was the best young hitter in the organization. Muncy 0 for 3. Serven 0 for 3. Williams 0 for 3 with two punchouts.

Ten strikeouts. Nobody past first base. Not once, in nine innings.

I've been doing this long enough to know a good pitcher can do that to anybody on a given day, and Woo has been good for years. But it's the second time this season I've written a column about our lineup getting one hit off a real starter, and I don't think that's an accident anymore. When Kurtz isn't crushing it, there's nobody in that order who scares a pitcher into changing his plan.

57 and 87, and I still had it on

Nobody warns you about this part of following the A's right now. There's no stadium to be mad at. There's no Coliseum drum, no BART ride, no tarps to complain about. It's a minor league park in Sacramento and a road uniform that says nothing on the front, and the only thing left holding any of this together is whether the young arms turn into something.

Jump might. Johnson might. Bolte, with eight homers and a .274 average in his first real look, might.

That's what I'm watching for, and that's why I sat through a 1:10 start on a Sunday to see my team get one hit. Eighteen games left. I'll take Tuesday, and I'll be annoyed about this one until then.

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