Rich Harden shines as Oakland Athletics defeat Toronto Blue Jays 4-1 – MLB Update
Rich Harden tossed seven effective innings on Tuesday, August 9 to help the Oakland Athletics beat the Toronto Blue Jays 4-1 at Rogers Centre.
Josh Willingham and Kurt Suzuki had their respective homers coupled with strong pitching spell by Harden to take a convincing victory.
However, it was the Rich Harden’s innings beyond ordinary that won the laurels on Tuesday. "Stuff-wise, that was maybe the best he's pitched," Oakland manager Bob Melvin said of Harden. "Really good changeup, changed speeds on his fastball."
For Melvin, it was more of an excitement to see Harden in form. "It's the most excited I've seen him coming into a dugout after an inning," Melvin said. "He was pumped up after that and he wanted that bad. He wanted to finish that inning and get us in the
dugout without them scoring."
Tuesday’s game kicked off with Brett Cecil being on the mound. Cecil was able to have a wonderfully executed first inning, allowing no run to the Athletics’ hitters. He was followed by a robust inning of Rich Harden, keeping the score tied.
But as the second inning began, Edwin Encarnacion found an opportunity as one of Harden’s pitches came slow to him, allowing him to capitalise on it. Edwin homered to give an early 1-0 lead to the Blue Jays.
Brett Cecil then had a scoreless innings pitching, allowing only a hit in the inning. Both the pitchers were then able to dominate the game with unplayable pitches that they threw, keeping the game at a 1-0 score as the Blue Jays had a lead.
However, things changed and went to the favour of the Oakland when the sixth inning kicked off with Cecil on the mound, having allowed no run to the Athletics. It was Josh Willingham who had a two-run homer to give a safe 2-1 lead to the Athletics by the
end of sixth inning.
Harden then pitched a shut-out sixth to maintain the lead followed by Kurt Suzuki’s homer that gave a 3-1 lead, an advantage that only Harden could utilise. Harden pitched the seven innings without letting the Toronto hitters score any runs.
Grant Balfour was able to maintain the Athletics lead of 3-1 by the end of eighth. Ryan Sweeney scored a single in the ninth to take the lead to 4-1 as Andrew Bailey arrived, the closer pitched to win the Athletics a wonderful 4-1 victory in the three-game
series’ first encounter.
The Athletics put in a brilliant performance as they restricted the Blue Jays’ offence from scoring in the crucial innings. The Blue Jays will be looking to improve their efforts in the next match-up.
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