James Kaprielian delivers in return to rotation, A’s beat Angels with two-out rally

Listed at 5-foot-8, Josh Harrison isn’t the tallest baseball player in the league. But got just enough air to snatch Max Stassi’s line drive, sno-coning the ball as he fell to his feet.

Holding onto that ball was imperative: It gets by, the tying runs score with the bases loaded and closer Andrew Chafin blows the A’s ninth save since Aug. 21. Because it stayed perched in Harrison’s glove, the A’s beat the Los Angeles Angels 3-1 on Saturday night and extended their win streak to four games.

“September is when good teams show up and we have to do that,” Sean Murphy said. “We’re still in this, we’re in striking distance, we’ve just got to win a bunch of games from here on out and we absolutely know we can do it.”

Now the A’s are guaranteed to, at least, win a winnable series before embarking on a gauntlet in which they face the Seattle Mariners and Houston Astros both twice at home and on the road to complete the regular season. The Astros are running away with the American League West title, but the Mariners are challenging for one of two wild card spots that the A’s, Toronto Blue Jays, New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox are also vying for.

The A’s win puts them two games back of the second wild card spot currently held by Toronto. The Red Sox sit a game up in first with the Yankees a half-game back of Toronto. A Mariners loss on Saturday puts Seattle four games back.

James Kaprielian’s rotation return

It was just two days ago that James Kaprielian moved to the bullpen. Concern over the rookie’s innings count forced the A’s brass to switch fresher-armed Daulton Jefferies into the rotation spot Kaprielian’s held since May.

Friday afternoon, Kaprielian learned his short stint in the bullpen would end with news that Jefferies would go to the injured list. He’d get his rotation spot back, push fatigue aside. But in Saturday’s start, Kaprielian looked like his old self.

While consistent command has eluded Kaprielian of late and created a domino effect of inefficient starts, he bounced right back into all his strengths at Angel Stadium. Kaprielian dealt six scoreless innings with just two hits allowed. He issued no walks and struck out five with the help of a high fastball, where he got some favorable calls and plenty of swings-and-misses. He tamed Shohei Ohtani, who struck out once swinging against him, and A’s-killer David Fletcher, who went hitless against him.

“I think he was kind of reinvigorated that he got a chance to pitch again,” manager Bob Melvin said. “We all know he’s a warrior, that’s one of his best attributes is just his strength and determination and how hard he fights. But to give us 6IP, 2hits, no walks, pretty good game.

“I’d say this is the biggest turnaround for him. And it came with a lot of determination.”

Kaprielian slowed the game down and made the right adjustments early before letting at-bats slip away. Was the bullpen-to-rotation shuffle a motivator? Kaprielian didn’t want to say.

“They make their decisions and it’s my job to do what they ask of me and that’s what I’m going to do,” Kaprielian said. “The ball got back into my hand today. I wanted to do my job and help this team win, and fortunately I was able to do that tonight.”

“To be a successful big leaguer, you have to be able to do that. To move it in, out, up and down,” Kaprielian said. “Tonight I was able to command the fastball pretty well and lost it for a little there but was able to get back on track.”

On offense

The A’s offense gave him run support early in a first-inning two-out rally against starter Jose Suarez. Matt Olson hit his 36th home run, a solo blast to make it 1-0. After Mark Canha drew a walk, Chad Pinder and Matt Chapman connected for a pair of doubles to make it 3-0. But they wouldn’t score after that.

Bullpen holds it together — with an ejection between

In relief of Kaprielian, Deolis Guerra looked to have escaped some traffic with a thrilling 3-6-1 double play, an Olson specialty at the first base corner. But Guerra stumbled over first base, forcing the ball out of his glove. While the first base umpire called Luis Rengifo out initially, replay review deemed him safe and everyone came back on the field with runners on the corners.

Melvin was ejected following the review after a heated conversation with umpires.

“You have 20 seconds to challenge a call, not an unlimited time,” Melvin said. “You can’t challenge a catch, no catch on the infield, only in the outfield. So to me that was just ridiculous.”

Jose Rojas made it pay, knocking Ohtani home from third with a single.

Harrison’s ability to hold on to the catch helped evade disaster Guerra flirted with. The Angels loading the bases on hits from Ohtani, Luis Rengifo and Rojas’ walk with two outs in the ninth inning. Stassi’s line drive was hit hard, but not hard enough.