Rich Harden pitches Oakland Athletics to a 5-4 win over Arizona Diamondbacks – MLB Update
Rich Harden staged a strong resurgence in Major League Baseball on Friday, July 1, as he powered the Oakland Athletics to a 5-4 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks at the O.co Coliseum in Oakland.
Harden made his first start for the Athletics in three years and it would be remembered for long. The right-handed pitcher won his debut game of the season with six strike-outs in as many innings pitched. His first game went for only two runs and this performance
would serve as a morale booster for the A’s with half of the season yet to play.
Hideki Matsui, Harden’s team-mate was all praise for the pitcher. He said that the bull-pen had an air of positivity with Rich’s return. Matsui said, "It's nice to see that kind of potential. It gives us something to look forward to in the second half."
Josh Collmenter’s performance on the contrary, lagged behind the debutants’. The starter for Diamondbacks was all over the plate with his wayward pitching and this inaccuracy cost him his fifth loss of the season. In the four innings pitched, he leaked five
runs and seven hits. His five strike-outs were not enough for the Diamondbacks as their hitters failed to reach the five runs he had given away.
The Diamondbacks opened their scoring account in the second inning with their designated hitter, Wily Mo Pena slashing his fourth home-run this season in a span of just ten games. The visitors then had to wait till the sixth inning to score again.
The Oakland Athletics made their presence felt at the plate in the fourth and fifth inning when a quick scoring spree put them well ahead of the Diamondbacks. Arizona could never recover from this set-back.
Matsui added the first run on the board for the A’s in the fourth inning before Collmenter lost focus in the fifth inning and gave away four runs. David DeJesus, Scott Sizemore, Cliff Pennington and Coco Crisp were among the scorers for the A’s.
Facing a deficit of four runs, the Diamondbacks replied strongly with Kelly Johnson doing most of the work. Johnson first scored in the sixth inning and then came back in the eighth to hit a gigantic 389-feet home-run to reduce the deficit to just two. Gerardo
Parra was the only player to back Johnson, adding one more in the eighth inning to make the score 5-4.
The other batters from Arizona failed miserably and did not connect a single pitch. Had they managed a few hits, the story could have been different but it was not to be.
The A’s are now one ahead in the three-game series. The second game is scheduled for Saturday, July 2.
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