Five stolen bases, then a slow roller
The Athletics stole five bases off Dylan Cease on Monday night in West Sacramento and still needed a ball that barely left the infield to finish the job.
Jeff McNeil came up with the bases loaded and two outs in the ninth, hit a slow roller toward shortstop off Louis Varland and beat it out. Donovan Walton scored from third. Athletics 6, Blue Jays 5.
Varland had walked two batters in the inning before McNeil arrived. That is how the A’s, 58-87 on the season, took their fifth win in six games.
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Bolte turned Cease into a spectator
Henry Bolte reached base five times. He walked three times, homered, reached once on an error, stole three bases and scored three runs. Zack Gelof added two RBIs, two runs and two steals of his own.
Most of that came at Cease’s expense. The A’s runners read his slow leg kick all night. He left with five runs against him, four earned, on four hits and two walks across five innings. He did strike out six, which took him to 227 for the season and level with his own career high.
The pattern started in the first. Bolte walked, stole second, moved to third on a flyball and came home on Gelof’s ground-rule double down the left field line. Two batters later Toronto third baseman Kazuma Okamoto dropped the ball during a rundown and Gelof scored on the mistake.
In the third Bolte walked and stole second and third in succession, then beat Okamoto’s throw home on a Gelof grounder. Gelof promptly stole second and third himself before Carlos Cortes singled him in. Bolte went the other way with a Cease fastball in the fifth for 5-1.
Toronto’s wild-card math gets harder
Alejandro Kirk homered in the second. Okamoto sent one 423 feet to left in the seventh, and Andres Gimenez looked to have rescued the night with a 415-foot drive off Hogan Harris with two outs in the ninth to tie it at 5-5.
Jacob Lopez had retired 14 Blue Jays in a row before that seventh unravelled on him. He finished with four runs on seven hits over six-plus innings, walking one.
Toronto drop to 72-73 and sit one game behind Cleveland for the third American League wild card. Three weeks remain.
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