A's lose finale against Houston, look forward to Frisco Boycott

What could have been... and what it ended up being. The Oakland Athletics lost a game to the Houston Astros on Sunday, falling 3-2 and losing nine of their 10 meetings with the reigning champions this season.

The A's made sure to stay sitting pretty in last position across the MLB landscape, boast a 28-74 record through the first 102 games of the season, and could have easily won their last matchup.

In fact, the A's found themselves leading Sunday's game 1-0 entering the second inning, 2-1 at the start of the seventh frame, and tied at 2-2 with the game's ninth and final inning about to start. You do the math on what happened next.

JJ Bleday hit his eighth homer of the year in the bottom of the first inning to put the A's on top. It was a blast, it went past the fences, it was a beautiful development, but as is the case more often than not with these Athletics, it served no purpose at the end of the day.

Good news: Medina pitched a reasonably good game lasting five full innings of two-hit, one-run ball while striking out six and walking only one batter. The problem was, of course, the run allowed and the fact that it came via homer.

Soderstrom himself got his name etched into the story of the game by getting his first RBI in the majors after hitting a pitch thrown by Houston's Hunter Brown and bringing JJ Bleday back home after touching all three bases before crossing home plate.

Of course, Mauricio Dubon had to ruin the party by sending folks attending the game on a sunny Sunday home earlier than they expcted when things got going in the ninth inning.

Everybody expected a good bunch of free baseball by then, but just a few pitches into the frame Dubon hit his fifth home run of the season to center field off a pitch by Chad Smith, gave Houston the lead, earned his team the win, and sank Oakland even deeper in their 2023 misery.

Cheer up, it's a day off for the A's before they take on the San Francisco Giants on Tuesday, so you won't have to endure any upset for at least 30+ hours or so.

Get ready, though, because according to Melissa Lockard of The Athletic the A's and the Giants fans have another Boycott in place scheduled for Tuesday, July 25, when both teams will meet in the East Bay.

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