Pinch hitter Tyler Soderstrom drew a four-pitch, walk-off walk from Colorado Rockies reliever Peter Lambert to cap a five-run uprising in the 11th inning as the host Oakland Athletics rallied for a 10-9 victory on Thursday afternoon.
The Rockies had scored twice in the top of the 11th against A’s star closer Mason Miller and two more runs on a Brendan Rodgers double off Brandon Bielak for a 9-5 advantage.
Oakland countered with Max Schuemann’s RBI double, Abraham Toro’s RBI single and JJ Bleday’s two-run, game-tying home run off the Rockies’ Matt Koch.
Lambert (2-3) took over and got two outs while the A’s were getting two aboard, but then followed an intentional walk to Kyle McCann with an unintentional free pass to Soderstrom, allowing the A’s to record a second win in a three-game interleague series of one-run decisions.
Bielak (1-0), who faced three batters and got just one of them out, was credited with the win.
The shocking finish came after the Rockies’ Jake Cave and Brenton Doyle delivered run-scoring singles off Miller in the top of the inning, before Rodgers doubled the advantage as a pinch hitter.
The blown lead in the 11th was the third in the final three innings for the Rockies, who saw Daz Cameron — making his A’s debut — homer in the last of the ninth to produce a 4-4 tie. Oakland’s Zack Gelof drilled a run-scoring single that evened the score 5-5 in the last of the 10th.
Cameron, who earlier had singled as part of an A’s rally from a 4-0 deficit, is the 27-year-old son of former major-leaguer Mike Cameron. Daz Cameron, who played for the Detroit Tigers in 2020-22, was called up from Triple-A before the game.
The Rockies appeared well on their way to a comfortable win after Ezequiel Tovar ignited two uprisings against Oakland starter Joey Estes with doubles and Colorado starter Ryan Feltner threw six shutout innings, after which the visitors led 4-0.
Tovar’s hits led off the first and sixth innings. He scored on both occasions.
Feltner allowed just four hits and two walks in his six-inning stint, striking out six.
Making just his fifth big-league start, Estes worked a career-best seven innings, allowing four runs and seven hits. He struck out six without walking anyone.
Seth Brown had three hits and scored three times for the A’s, who out-hit the visitors 17-11. McCann and Schuemann also finished with three hits, while J.D. Davis and Gelof joined Cameron with two.
Cave, Doyle, Tovar and Elehuris Montero collected two hits apiece for Colorado, which suffered its 10th one-run loss of the season.
–Field Level Media