Zack Gelof singled to open the ninth, and Lawrence Butler did not wait long to end it. The Athletics right fielder drove a two-run homer to right-center off Seattle closer Andrés Muñoz for his second home run of the afternoon, lifting Oakland to an 8-7 walk-off win over the Mariners on Sunday at Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento.
The Associated Press reported Butler's drive as his 16th of the season and the finishing blow in a game the Athletics had trailed by four runs. Per the CBS Sports box score, Butler finished 2-for-4 with four RBIs and two home runs. ESPN's box matches that line.
Elvis Alvarado (5-3) worked a one-hit ninth for the win; Muñoz (5-6) took the loss after allowing Gelof's leadoff single and Butler's walk-off.
Back-to-back in the first, then a long climb
Oakland had started the day with the same pairing. Gelof and Butler homered on consecutive pitches in the first inning off Bryce Miller, the AP noted, putting the Athletics ahead 2-0 before Seattle answered.
Randy Arozarena's two-run shot in the third tied it, and the Mariners built a 6-2 lead through the fifth with Arozarena adding an RBI single in the fourth and more traffic around the plate in the middle innings.
Butler's first contribution to the comeback was quieter than a highlight-reel swing. In a four-run seventh that erased the deficit, Gabe Speier walked Jhonny Pereda with the bases loaded, Butler grounded out to second to score Bolte, and pinch-hitter Shea Langeliers singled home two against Seranthony Dominguez, the AP reported.
The Athletics had climbed from 6-2 to 6-6 without needing another Butler home run - yet.
Arozarena answers, Butler closes
Arozarena, who finished with two home runs and four RBIs of his own, put Seattle back in front 7-6 with a solo shot in the eighth off Hogan Harris. Muñoz then stranded a runner at third in the bottom of the eighth before Gelof opened the ninth and Butler walked it off.
The sequence left little room for ambiguity about who dictated the final two innings for Oakland. Alvarado kept the Mariners from adding on. Butler supplied the only runs that mattered after Arozarena's eighth-inning blast. For a club sitting at 61-89, an afternoon that began with consecutive homers and ended with a closer-beating drive is the kind of complete outfield night that rarely arrives in September.
Seattle fell to 70-80 and, per the AP, remained five games back in the AL West with 12 games to play and six games off the final wild-card pace after the series. The Athletics took five of seven from the Mariners across an 11-day span, including Friday's extra-inning win on Donovan Walton's 10th-inning homer.
Butler's four RBIs against Seattle this season reached 13 after Sunday, the AP noted. The box line - two hits, two homers, four driven in - does not fully capture how often he appeared in the middle of Oakland's rallies: the first-inning answer to nothing, the seventh-inning groundout that kept the inning alive for Langeliers, and the ninth-inning swing that finished Muñoz.
The Mariners turn the page with Kade Anderson scheduled to start Monday at the Angels, according to the AP notes. Oakland sends Jack Perkins to the mound Tuesday at Tampa Bay. Whatever those next starts bring, Sunday already supplied the clearest Athletics snapshot of the weekend: Gelof on, Butler gone, and an 8-7 scoreboard that flipped on the last pitch of the day.
Sources
CBS Sports
ESPN
ESPN
