ANAHEIM — Is it possible the A’s starting rotation’s troubles have bottomed out?
After going three weeks without a win from a starter, Oakland saw Kendall Graveman throw 62/3 innings of two-run ball in a 5-4 win over the Angels Thursday. It was the club’s first win from a starter since June 1, the space of 17 games.
That performance could be added to news that Sean Manaea and Rich Hill should be back in the rotation within 10 days. And the hottest pitcher in the organization, left-hander Dillon Overton, will make his Major League debut Saturday. He’s 7-0 with a 1.40 ERA in his last seven starts for Nashville.
“I think we’re starting to pitch well and the guys are starting to notice that at the plate,” Graveman said in defense of the rotation, which was 0-9 with a 5.29 ERA in the last 17 games. The A’s record for longest streak without a win by a starter was 18 in 1997, and that’s somewhere the current club did not want to go.
“I didn’t know the number, but we’ve got to give the guys a chance to win,” Graveman said. “The guys in the bullpen have been doing a great job of coming in and competing, if we can just get deep in the ballgame for them.”
Overton, the A’s second-round draft pick in 2013, is not necessarily a player the 30-42 A’s thought they’d be turning to this early in the season. But numbers don’t lie, and he’s been simply dominant the last five weeks for Nashville.
“He’s earned this,” manager Bob Melvin said. The manager held off making the announcement until after the game because Overton hadn’t been notified himself until Thursday evening.
The resurgence of Graveman is a major boost for the A’s rotation. He’s locked in his sinker in his last two starts, he’s gone deep in games in back-to-back starts against the Angels and he’s allowed just four runs in his last three starts over the space of 172/3 innings. Thursday he got 20 outs, and 14 of those, including two double plays, came on ground balls.
“Fourteen is a good number for me, for anybody really,” Graveman said. “You want ground balls, let the defense do its thing. That’s what I’m always looking to do.”
Melvin hadn’t seen that from Graveman earlier in the year, but the combination of catcher Stephen Vogt working on a new setup to get lower behind the plate and Graveman locating the downward plane has made for a good combination.
“The last couple of games have been all about his sinker,” the manager said. “The last couple of games, he’s really looked like himself. Not only does he have sink, but he has it at a pretty good velocity at 93, 94 mph, and that’s kind of what gives him his mojo out there.”
There was plenty of mojo courtesy of Marcus Semien, whose three-run homer was the centerpiece of a four-run second inning that gave Graveman room to work. The A’s would get much beyond that, but Khris Davis’ 17th homer in the fifth got the score to 5-2 and put Oakland in position to survive a two-run Jeff Bandy homer off Sean Doolittle in the ninth.
The game’s scariest moment came just after the homer when the Angels’ Jefry Marte pinch-hit and lost his bat on a swing. The bat hit home plate umpire Paul Emmel, who had to leave the game with blood gushing from his forehead. The Angels said after the game that Emmel would be fine but was being taken to a hospital to have some stitches.
For more on the A’s, see John Hickey’s Inside the A’s blog at ibabuzz.com/athletics. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/JHickey3.