JP Sears gives bullpen a break, but Athletics are shut down by Braves

JP Sears gave the Athletics’ overworked bullpen a break Friday night, but offense was in short supply in a 4-2 road loss to the Atlanta Braves.

Sears (4-4) pitched a season-high seven innings, giving up four runs on six hits with two walks and five strikeouts. HIs 97 pitches were the second-most he’s thrown this season, and came with the A’s short of relievers with Lucas Erceg and Kyle Muller on the injured list and Mason Miller unavailable after throwing 32 pitches Thursday night.

Given that A’s relievers have thrown a major league high of 228 2/3 innings going in to the game, manager Mark Kotsay was grateful, having seen his team play into extra innings three times in the previous eight games.

“To get through seven tonight with the way the bullpen was, it was kind of what we needed,” Kotsay said.”It was unfortunate our offense couldn’t get going and couldn’t do anything against  (Reynoldo) Lopez or their bullpen for that matter.”

Lopez shut down the Athletics for six innings before giving way to the bullpen. The A’s threatened in the eighth against Joe Jimenez when JJ Bleday walked and Brent Rooker singled, but Miguel Andujar flied to center, Seth Brown struck out for the fourth time in the game and then Kyle McCann was called out on strikes.

The Athletics, 23-36, fell to a season-high 13 games below .500. Atlanta, 32-23, came in having lost 10 of its previous 15 games and scoring 49 runs in that span.

In their last eight games, the A’s are hitting .143 (10-for-70) with runners in scoring position, including 1-for-8 Friday night against Atlanta.

Lopez (3-2) gave up four hits and struck out a season-high eight batters in six innings, dropping his season earned run average to 1.73. After throwing 87 pitches, 57 of them strikes, he gave way to ex-Giants reliever Pierce Johnson in the seventh.

Raisel Iglesias pitched the ninth for Atlanta for his 14th save, giving up a run on an RBI ground out by Aledmys Diaz. Diaz drove in Zack Gelof, who had a leadoff double.

Atlanta scratched out a run on its second sacrifice fly of the game in the sixth, this one by Orlando Arcia. Former A’s star Matt Olson started the inning with a ground single to right and took third on Adam Duval’s double to left center.

The A’s scored in the fourth against Lopez on a sacrifice fly by Gelof. Miguel Andujar opened the inning with a single, and after Seth Brown struck out, Andujar stole second and took third on a single to left by Kyle McCann. Andujar scored on Gelof’s fly out to left.

The Braves made Sears throw 24 pitches in the first inning, 13 for strikes, and scored on Olson’s shallow sacrifice fly to right field that brought home Austin Riley. Jared Kelenic hit a two-run double in the second, by which time Sears trailed 3-0 and had thrown 42 pitches.

“I felt good with my stuff, I kind of nibbled a little bit in the first inning and in the second inning giving into Kelenic with a good fastball on 2-0 is maybe something I regret,” Sears said.

Sears did take solace in going seven innings.

“Coming into the game, I knew we had a series in Tampa where we used our guys a lot and we have the injury bug as well,” Sears said. “Just trying to give our bullpen a rest tonight and knew that was part of my job.”

NOTABLE

— The A’s made the dubious choice to use a challenge in the second inning when Andujar made an ill-advised attempt to go from second to third on a grounder by McCann and was thrown out at third by shortstop Arcia. The ruling was upheld and the A’s had no remaining challenges.

Andujar had doubled to right center to lead off the inning.

— When Abraham Toro bounced an opposite field single to left field in the third inning, it was his 39th hit in the month of May, the most since Carney Lansford had 39 hits in May of 1989. Toro’s 39 hits led the majors in May and were four  more than Vladimir Guerrero Jr.

— The A’s finished 9-19 in May and have had a losing record in 10 consecutive months and the 14th time in the last 15 months.

— Brady Basso recorded a 1-2-3 inning in his major league debut in the eighth inning for the A’s. Basso threw eight pitches, six of which were strikes, and faced the heart of the Atlanta order.

“It’s a really nice inning,” Kotsay said. “He was really composed out there for his first outing. It was good stuff.”