The Oakland A’s suffered a gut-punch loss to the worst team in Major League Baseball.
A’s reliever Norge Ruiz, looking for his first career Major League save, instead gave up four runs in the bottom of the 10th inning, including a three-run homer to Joey Meneses in a 7-5 loss to the Washington Nationals.
It appeared the A’s had things well under control after catcher Shea Langeliers’ two-RBI double off the right field wall in the 10th inning gave his team a 5-3 lead.
Prior to Langeliers’ at-bat, Vimael Machín, with two outs, worked a nine-pitch walk against Nationals reliever Hunter Harvey. Machín, down to his last strike, fouled off three fastballs between 98 and 99 mph before he took ball four.
That set up Langeliers, who entered Thursday in an 0-for-15 slump. But on a 2-1 count, he doubled to score both Sheldon Neuse and Machín.
Ruiz, though, allowed an RBI single to Keibert Ruiz in the 10th before Meneses’ drive with two runners on cleared the right field wall.
Oakland now starts a three-game series against the Baltimore Orioles on Friday at Camden Yards.
The A’s bullpen also allowed single runs in the seventh and eighth innings.
Joel Payamps gave up an earned run in the seventh on a fielder’s choice to cut Oakland’s lead to 3-2, and after A.J. Puk replaced Sam Moll with two out in the eighth, he allowed an RBI single to Ildemaro Vargas to tie the game.
Puk had an adventurous ninth inning after pinch-hitter Victor Robles stole second base with one out. But Puk struck out Luis García looking and got César Hernández on a deep fly ball to left-center field.
The A’s took a 3-1 lead in the top of the seventh inning on RBI singles from Tony Kemp and Seth Brown. With two outs, Kemp singled to right to score Cristian Pache from second base and after a Sean Murphy base hit, Brown singled to center to score Kemp.
Langeliers accounted for the A’s first run, as his fifth-inning homer to left tied the game 1-1 and snapped the rookie catcher’s 0-for-16 skid at the plate.
The homer also helped Waldichuk avoid the loss in the MLB debut, as he allowed five hits and struck out six in 4⅔ innings.
Waldichuk came as advertised, as his strikeout total was the most for an A’s pitcher in his MLB debut since Dallas Braden had six in six innings on April 24, 2007.
Although he walked four, five of his strikeouts came on four-seam fastballs in the 95-96 mph range. This season, between Double-A and Triple-A, Waldichuk, a Saint Mary’s College product, struck out 137 in 95.0 innings.
Through the first three innings, Waldichuk was able to minimize the damage after falling into some early trouble.
The Nationals already had a 1-0 lead in the first inning when a Nelson Cruz single put runners on first and third with one out. But Waldichuk then got Luis García to ground out before César Hernández struck out on a 95 mph fastball.
In the second inning, Nationals outfielder Alex Call led off with a triple, but Waldichuk came back to strike out Lane Adams and Riley Adams and get Ildemaro Vargas to ground out. Waldichuk then left the bases loaded in third inning after he got Call to fly out.
In all, Waldichuk stranded six runners in the first three innings.
Waldichuk is the fifth Saint Mary’s player to see action in the big leagues this season, joining Kyle Barraclough (Los Angeles Angels), Corbin Burnes (Milwaukee), Tony Gonsolin (Los Angles Dodgers), and Patrick Wisdom (Chicago Cubs).
Waldichuk, at 6-4 and 220 pounds, was acquired from the New York Yankees on Aug. 1 with Luis Medina, JP Sears, and minor leaguer Cooper Bowman for Frankie Montas and Lou Trivino.
The A’s have now had 16 players make their MLB debuts this season. Five of those players were in Thursday’s lineup, including Cody Thomas, a 13th-round draft pick of the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2016.
Thomas, 27, played left field and singled in the fourth inning off of Nationals starting pitcher Paulo Espino for his first big league hit.
It’s been an adventure for Thomas, 27, to get to this point. After three-plus years in the Dodgers’ system, rising to Double-A in 2019, Thomas missed the entire 2020 season due to the pandemic. Then he had to sit out parts of the last two seasons with an Achilles injury.
Thomas, who came to the A’s in a Feb. 2021 trade with the Dodgers, hit 18 home runs with a 1.028 OPS in 59 games in Las Vegas last year before his Achilles issues began to crop up. Thomas then had surgery on his right Achilles tendon in February of this year.
Thomas began a rehab assignment at the A’s Arizona Complex League affiliate on Aug. 8 and 15 days later, was reinstated from the injured list and assigned to Triple-A Las Vegas. With the Aviators this season, Thomas batted a combined .226 with three doubles, a home run, and seven RBI in 10 games overall.
