Athletics: Top Five Plays of the 2019 Season

Despite a disappointing end to the 2019 season, the Oakland Athletics had an exciting year. Starting in Japan and through an 11-game win streak, a no-hitter and the breakout performances from prospects and established players alike, the Green and Gold had some great moments, so let’s take a look at the five best plays from the A’s season.

When you win 97 games, along the way introducing future team cornerstones, breaking franchise records and witnessing several players turn into legitimate MVP candidates, regardless of how the season ended, fans have a lot to be excited about. And so is the case for the Oakland Athletics, who bowed out once again in the AL Wild Card Game but who also experienced their most interesting and provocative season in a while.

With as many dominant players on both sides of the ball that the A’s have, they put together one of the best catalogs of incredible plays of any MLB team last season.

Without further ado, let’s take a look at the Oakland Athletics’ top five plays of 2019.

5. Matt Olson home run & Ramon Laureano double, July 23 vs Houston

At this point in the season, the Oakland Athletics were 58-44, seven games back of the Astros and had gone 1-8 against Houston. Down 2-0 in the top of the ninth, in danger of setting up yet another sweep at the hands of the Astros, Matt Olson hit a three-run homer off of Roberto Osuna to take a 3-2 lead heading into the bottom of the ninth.

As the Astros always do, they tied the game in the frame and sent it to extras, where the A’s bullpen held on until the 11th inning, when Ramon Laureano – who was in the middle of a July in which he slashed .392/.443/.838 with a 1.281 OPS, eight home runs, 22 runs scored, 18 RBIs and 17 XBH – hit an RBI ground-rule double that would give the A’s a 4-3 lead.

This was an eventful game for Ramon Laureano, who had earlier misplayed a ball in center field that ended up at the wall, allowing an inside-the-park home run for Yuli Gurriel.

This was yet another sign not only that Laureano was a gamer, but that the A’s could hang with the Astros, and hang with Houston they did, going 7-3 against the AL Champions from this game to their last matchup.

3. Ramon Laureano home run robbery double play, April 21 vs Toronto

In a little over a year, Ramon Laureano has endeared himself to Oakland Athletics’ fans and his teammates for his all-out play, and Ramon Laureano’s arm has embedded itself as one of the most singularly dangerous weapons in MLB.

If his absurd running catch and throw from center against the Angels in 2018 wasn’t enough to scare you, his open to 2019 was more than enough to stop teams from running on Laureano.

But this play was maybe the most purely spectacular play by an A’s player in 2019, ignoring context.

Laureano ran out and robbed a home run in left-center before launching a rocket into the infield that ended up being an 8-2-4 double play. He showed off all the Laureano tools: speed in the outfield, spacial awareness, bounce at the wall, hand-eye coordination, a preposterous arm, and an overthrow because with Laureano you have to take a little bit of bad to outweigh the insane amount of good.

2. Matt Chapman two-run home run, September 25 vs Angels

In 2018, every time the A’s needed him, Khris Davis stepped up and bailed them out. With Davis struggling through most of 2019, the rest of the lineup stepped up, from Matt Olson to Ramon Laureano to Mark Canha to Marcus Semien. But no player had a bigger hit in 2019 than Matt Chapman against the LA Angels on September 25.

Despite taking off after the All-Star break and virtually establishing a spot in the Wild Card Game, the A’s were still scuffling at the close of the regular season with the Rays and Cleveland Indians breathing down their necks. And down 2-1 in the top of the ninth, they were in danger of losing their third in a row and dropping a half-game behind the Rays.

But once again, like in mid-June, Chapman delivered a two-run shot that gave us the best Glen Kuiper call of the season and kept the A’s in the driver’s seat for AL Wild Card.

(Video via NBC Sports Bay Area)

Hopefully only the first of many huge September hits for the All-Star third baseman.

1. Jurickson Profar and Ramon Laureano save Mike Fiers’ No-Hitter, May 7 vs Reds

History remembers, and in the case of the Oakland Athletics’ top plays from the 2019 season, history did.

Before the A’s were playing in the AL Wild Card Game, or even sniffing a playoff berth, they were struggling to open the season. Matt Olson was injured, the pitching staff couldn’t string together consecutive good outings and they had been swept by the Blue Jays TWICE.

But on this night, nothing – even a lighting (not lightning) delay that lasted over an hour– would stop Mike Fiers on his way to his second career no-hitter.

In the sixth inning, Fiers got help on back-to-back outs from the two men lined up behind him.

First, with one out in the frame, Jurickson Profar made a spectacular diving catch to stop a blooper from dropping in shallow right field.

(Video via MLB.com)

On the VERY NEXT PITCH, Ramon Laureano made a leaping, home-run-robbing, etched-in-history catch to halt what would have been a Joey Votto solo home-run.

(Video via MLB.com)

Even at the moment, this felt like a special play. And it stood the test of time (six months is pretty long).