Apr 26, 2013; Oakland, CA, USA; Oakland Athletics starting pitcher Tommy Milone (57) pitches against the Baltimore Orioles during the first inning at O.Co Coliseum. Mandatory Credit: Ed Szczepanski-USA TODAY Sports

Milone had to work extremely hard tonight to make it through his 6 innings to nail down the victory.  The top of the 2nd inning was the most adventurous, and could have sent the game in an entirely different direction had Milone broken rather than just bent.  Another well placed pop up put the lead off man aboard, a couple of uncharacteristic walks by Milone would load the bases with nobody out.  A first pitch pop up by Elliot Johnson, and strikeouts of Lorenzo Cain and Alcides Escobar would enable Milone to escape the inning unscathed.  The two arduous innings though would drive up Milone’s pitch count at an early stage.  Jesse Chavez was warming up in the bullpen during the 2nd when Milone was on the ropes.  Had the Royals been able to come up with a big hit Milone’s night may have been much shorter.

Milone overcame the high early pitch count and worked his way through 6 solid innings while allowing just the 1 run in the 1st.  Milone allowed 5 hits, 1 ER, with 3 walks and 4 strikeouts to snap his 5 start losing streak.  He got just enough support tonight, and it came just in time to get him the W.

The A’s offense woke up from their slumber in the bottom of the 6th inning as Eric Sogard led off with a double.  Coco Crisp walked as the lineup turned over, and a wild pitch moved Sogard to 3rd in the process.  Jed Lowrie‘s sacrifice fly tied the game up at 1 as Sogard easily beat Lorenzo Cain’s throw from center.  Brandon Moss would give the A’s the 2-1 lead with an RBI triple just to the left of straight away center field.  That would be all the offense the A’s would get, and it ended up being all they would need.

Ryan Cook and Seann Doolittle would work nice clean innings in the 7th and the 8th, with 2 strikeouts from Cook.  Grant Balfour worked a scoreless 9th for his 8th save of the season, he walked the lead off batter but retired the side in order quickly after that.

The A’s are now back to the .500 mark that very well could have started to slip away from them.  At 22-22, the A’s can now start to rebuild the good feelings the team had in the early stages of the season.  With Coco Crisp and Chris Young back in the fold, the team will start to function as a unit once again.

The A’s go for the sweep tomorrow as A.J. Griffin (4-3, 3.48 ERA) takes on Luis Mendoza (1-2, 6.00 ERA).  A sweep here will send the A’s off to Arlington for the first time in much better shape and ready for their first two city Texas road trip of the season versus the Rangers and Astros.

Road trips to the east coast proved difficult, lost series and sweeps against AL East opponents the Boston Red Sox and Tampa Bay Rays brought the team back to Earth with a thud.  The struggles have continued and now the team sits at 20-22, the low watermark of the season, and finds themselves 7.5 games back of the Texas Rangers who just took two out of three in Oakland.

There are some pretty clear reasons why the team was where it was, and is where it is.

The pitching staff has been a disappointment overall.  Thought to be the strength of this team, the starting pitching has taken its lumps. Brett Anderson can’t stay healthy, Jarrod Parker has a 6.86 ERA, and Dan Straily can’t seem to convert his minor league success to the major leagues.  Tommy Milone and A.J. Griffin have been the strongest starters, both with ERA’s in the 3′s, and Bartolo Colon has been essentially the same pitcher he was in 2012.  If the A’s wish to get back into the race, Anderson and Parker will have to be at the forefront of the charge.  If Milone and Griffin are going to be called upon to pitch like aces, the team will likely fall short of their goals in 2013.

The injury bug has been especially cruel to the Athletics so far.  It was presumed before the season began that Bob Melvin would have trouble finding playing time for all 5 of his outfielders.  Yoenis Cespedes, Coco Crisp, and Josh Reddick were the starting three, with Chris Young and Seth Smith filling in the gaps and filling the DH spot.  At this point, Josh Reddick is on the DL and may not be back for a while, Chris Young is hopefully about to be activated, and Coco Crisp just returned from the DL on Wednesday.  Yoenis Cespedes served his time on the DL too with a hand injury.  Factor in the aforementioned health problems of Brett Anderson and it’s pretty easy to see why this team has fallen so far in such a short amount of time.  Players like Michael Taylor and Luke Montz are getting more playing time than they should on a team that is supposed to contend, and the team simply cannot win that way.

May 10, 2013; Seattle, WA, USA; Oakland Athletics third baseman Josh Donaldson (20) waits for the pitch during that game against the Seattle Mariners at Safeco FIeld. Seattle defeated Oakland 6-3. Mandatory Credit: Steven Bisig-USA TODAY Sports

Perhaps the biggest revelation has been the emergence of Josh Donaldson and Brandon Moss as established middle of the order contributors.  Donaldson, the most emphatic of the two has posted an impressive .316/.390/.520 line with 5 home runs, 14 doubles, and a team leading 25 RBI. Moss, while not quite as eye popping has posted a .252/.354/.433 line with 6 home runs and 22 RBI.  There were questions as to whether those two would be able to repeat their breakout performances from 2012, and it appears as if both of them are giving us a firm yes.

The late acquistion of Jed Lowrie has paid significant dividends in the early going.  Much like the outfield the middle infield was expected to be clogged with talent.  Injuries during spring weeded out the possiblities for the A’s.  The hot spring for Eric Sogard made the second base job his, but Lowrie’s hot spring solidified himself as the A’s everyday shortstop.  He has rewarded that decision with a .399/.383/.448 line with 3 home runs, and 14 doubles to go along with 19 RBI.  His defense is a little bit questionable, but he’s made up for it with his bat.  In the absence of a healthy and productive Josh Reddick in the lineup, Lowrie has given the A’s a viable option to hit ahead of Yoenis Cespedes.

If the A’s want to right the ship, they need to get as many important players back as possible, and keep them healthy.  Yoenis Cespedes needs to get hot, red hot like we all know he is capable of.  The pitching staff needs to learn once again how to live up to their potential.  Ryan Cook needs to stop giving us ulcers during his innings.  Sean Doolittle needs to keep doing exactly what he’s doing.  The A’s simply may need to recapture just a little bit of that magic that propelled them to the playoffs in 2012.  It’s still early enough to get things going the right way, but it won’t be early for long.

It was only a 5 game losing streak, but it felt like a lot more.  But tonight, not Angel Hernandez, not Joe Torre, not Chris Perez, not Kyle Seager, and not the A’s themselves would be able to prevent the A’s from coming away with a victory in Seattle tonight.  Jarrod Parker finally showed some signs of the pitcher we all saw last season, in one of his best performances of 2013 to best the Mariners and Brandon Maurer.

May 11, 2013; Seattle, WA, USA; Oakland Athletics pitcher Grant Balfour (50) is greeted by catcher Derek Norris (36) after the final out against the Seattle Mariners at Safeco Field. Oakland defeated Seattle, 4-3, as Balfour earned his sixth save. Mandatory Credit: Joe Nicholson-USA TODAY Sports

The game began uneventfully, neither team did anything in the first inning.  Josh Donaldson went deep for his 5th home run of the season in the top of the 2nd inning, the Mariners did nothing when a walk was erased with an inning ending double play in their half.  Yoenis Cespedes returned the favor with his own inning ending double play in the top of the 3rd, and the Mariners once again did nothing with their half (Sensing a theme?).  The A’s got on the board again in the top of the 4th when Daric Barton launched his first home run of the season, the Mariners again did nothing (2 walks, one of which was picked off by a snap throw from Derek Norris).  Jed Lowrie drove in the A’s third run of the game on a long RBI single in the top of the 5th, the Mariners finally did something in the bottom half when Kelly Shoppach went to the opposite field for a 2-run home run following a Justin Smoak walk with pop up and a force out sandwiched in between.  That was the first base hit allowed by Jarrod Parker in the game, it may have only been 4.2 innings of no hit ball, but all things considered it’s extremely impressive for him.  Brandon Moss would respond with his 5th home run of the season in the 6th.

Parker would work into the 7th inning, going 6.1 innings while allowing 3 hits, 3 ER, 4 walks, and 8 strikeouts in getting his second win of the season.  Sean Doolittle allowed his first inherited runner to score in taking over for Parker, accounting for the 3rd ER charged to him.  Doolittle would escape the inning with any further damage done.  Ryan Cook would bring us a cardiac inning in the 8th, loading up the bases on two singles and a walk, but he would strike out the side in the process to walk across the tight rope and escape disaster.  Grant Balfour would convert the save in the 9th, his 24th straight, but it wouldn’t come easy as the M’s would get the tying and potential winning runs aboard.  The A’s bullpen managed to hold the Mariners down, but they sure didn’t act like they wanted to.

On the offensive side, Jed Lowrie would shine brightest with a 3 for 4 night and an RBI single.  Josh Donaldson (2-4), Daric Barton (1-4), and Brandon Moss (1-4) accounted for each of the other three single runs that gave the A’s just barely enough to pull out this win.

May 11, 2013; Seattle, WA, USA; Oakland Athletics center fielder Yoenis Cespedes (52) hits the wall after robbing a home run against the Seattle Mariners during the sixth inning at Safeco Field. Oakland defeated Seattle, 4-3. Mandatory Credit: Joe Nicholson-USA TODAY Sports

The highlight of the night had to be the sensational play by Yoenis Cespedes in center field to rob Kyle Seager of at least extra bases and perhaps more.  Yoenis caught the ball with a leap and a crash into the wall after a dead run just to the left of straight away center field.  He appeared to maybe have gotten his bell run a little bit, but apparently no harm was done.

With the win the A’s are back at .500 at 19-19.

It seems hard to believe, but the A’s will have a chance to win the series tomorrow afternoon as Tommy Milone (3-4, 3.14 ERA) takes on old friend Joe Saunders (2-4, 6.15 ERA).  Saunders at times has been able to shut down the Athletics, but that was primarily during his days with the Los Angeles Angels.  The A’s roughed him up a little, scoring 4 runs in 4 innings against Saunders for the team’s first win of 2013 back on April 3rd.