Zac Gallen impresses as D-backs take home 5th straight in win over A’s

PHOENIX — The Oakland Athletics waltzed into Chase Field as one of the hottest teams in baseball on Monday night.

Oakland entered play as the best team in baseball (.727), was fifth in home runs (35) and tied for third in RBIs (113). The pitching staff had the fourth-best ERA in the big leagues (3.52) and allowed a league-low seven home runs through 22 games.

Basically, the A’s have been red hot over the first third of the season.

But just like the monsoon storms that greeted the Valley late Monday afternoon, the Athletics’ momentum was washed out in a hurry by the arm of starting pitcher Zac Gallen and the streaking D-backs.

Turning in his best start as a D-back, the hurler dominated the visiting squad, allowing just three hits and one earned run in seven innings of work in the team’s 4-3 win over the A’s. Gallen struck out eight and walked just one as Arizona (12-11) extended its wining streak to five games, while snapping Oakland’s (16-7).

“This game doesn’t happen without Zac Gallen and doing exactly what he did,” manager Torey Lovullo said after the win. “He goes seven unbelievable innings, he made one mistake to a pretty good hitter .. for his only blemish, but I thought we did a lot of things right despite having a couple mistakes that were made in the eighth inning.”

Gallen was dialed in right from the start. He was perfect through the first three innings, going through Oakland’s lineup with ease the first time around. Adding to the early-inning success was outfielder David Peralta, who broke the 0-0 tie with a solo shot in the bottom of the frame. More on him later.

It wasn’t until the fourth inning when Gallen’s clean streak came to an end.

After finding success early on with his changeup, the pitcher couldn’t find the zone on the sixth pitch of Marcus Semien’s plate appearance to lead off the fourth inning.

Gallen didn’t let the walk derail his performance, as he recorded three straight outs to end the frame. He followed up the fourth inning with a two-strikeout fifth to keep his no-hit bid intact.

All good things must come to an end, however, as Gallen ran into some trouble in the back half of the game.

Recording an out to start the sixth inning, Gallen was tagged with back-to-back singles by Oakland’s Austin Allen and Semien. But while the no-hit bid was over, there was still an inning to be finished. Similar to the fourth, Gallen refocused and got out of the frame with consecutive strikeouts.

The D-backs offense was able to provided a pick-me-up of sorts for Gallen, however, padding the lead with two more runs in the seventh thanks to RBIs from third baseman Eduardo Escobar (fielder’s choice) and catcher Carson Kelly (single).

But as stellar as Gallen pitched throughout the night, his scoreless streak finally came to an end in the seventh inning.

Looking at two outs and no one on, A’s outfielder Robbie Grossman stepped up to the plate. Needing little to make his mark on the evening, Grossman took Gallen deep on the second pitch of the at-bat to bring Oakland within two runs.

Gallen finished the inning, getting Stephen Piscotty to groundout, before Lovullo made the decision to pull the starter in favor of Hector Rondon.

Unfortunately for the D-backs, that’s when things took a turn.

Rondon did not have the same success as Gallen in the eighth inning, giving up a single, a double and a pop up before a walk and sac fly resulted in an Athletics’ run. He was relieved by Andrew Chafin, who looked to have Matt Olson out on a pop up only to have Nick Ahmed fail to make the catch, recording an error and giving the Athletics the equalizing run in the process.

“It’s a ball I’d catch a 100 times out of 100 if I go do it right now,” Ahmed said after the game. “I just missed it, no excuses.”

Fortunately for the shortstop, he made up for the gaffe in the ninth.

Needing a spark in the final frame, Ahmed put his team in a prime position to take the home the victory with a leadoff double. Second baseman Ketel Marte moved Ahmed over to third with a single down the third-base line, paving the way for Peralta. Staring down an 0-2 count, the outfielder put an end to the Athletics’ comeback hopes, bringing in Ahmed with a walk-off single.

“That’s an exciting way to end a game,” Lovullo said. “Any time you end the game in a walkoff fashion it feels really good. It feels really nice. … It falls on David and he comes through once again. He had a huge day for us with three hits. … He’s continued to swing a hot bat.”

The D-backs secured their five straight win Monday night, but even with his impressive outing, Gallen is still looking for his first victory of the year as reliever Stefan Crichton was credited with the win for his work in the ninth.

BASE HITS

– Lovullo felt starting pitcher Madison Bumgarner’s simulated game went “extremely well” and added the ace had slight discomfort in his back. Bumgarner tossed 46 pitches in the sim game.

– The D-backs recorded back-to-back 5.0 hitless innings to start a game for the first time since June 12-13, 2015, against the San Francisco Giants.

-With the win, the D-backs improve to an MLB-leading 6-1 in one-run games.

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