Athletics Snap a 10-Game Skid With a 15-1 Avalanche, Then Give It All Back in Arizona

There are bad weeks, there are good weeks, and then there is whatever the Athletics just lived through. In the span of six games, the A's absorbed a 23-4 beating, delivered a 15-1 haymaker that ended a 10-game losing streak, and gave away a ninth-inning miracle in extra innings — all while going 2-4 on the week and slipping to 43-59. If you follow Athletics news for the storylines rather than the standings, this week in review had everything: a rookie's no-hit bid, a first career home run, a freak injury, and more late-inning drama than a team 16 games under .500 has any business producing.

The Skid Hits 10, Then Ends With an Avalanche

The Athletics came out of the All-Star break at 41-55, lugging a nine-game losing streak, and Friday night against Washington at Sutter Health Park made it an even 10 in the ugliest way imaginable. Rookie left-hander Gage Jump was tagged for four runs in 3.2 innings, the bullpen turned a bad night into a historic one, and the Nationals kept piling on until the scoreboard read 23-4. Tyler Soderstrom's solo homer was roughly the only clip worth saving from a game that felt over by the fourth inning.

Then Saturday happened. J.T. Ginn took a no-hitter into the seventh inning and finished with 6.1 innings of one-hit, shutout baseball and seven strikeouts, while the offense buried Washington 15-1. Per MLB.com, the 14-run margin was the largest in a game that snapped a losing streak of 10 or more since May 24, 1955 — a genuinely obscure, genuinely fun piece of history. Soderstrom launched a two-run shot, his 16th of the season, Carlos Cortes homered and doubled in a run, and Shea Langeliers cleared the bases with a double. Rookie infielder Joshua Kuroda-Grauer, meanwhile, ran his hit total to 22, the most by any Athletics player before his 15th career game.

Sunday brought the correction. Washington took the finale 5-2 behind Foster Griffin to claim the series, and the A's headed for the desert at 42-57, having outscored an opponent 15-1 in a week they were outscored by 26 overall.

Heartbreak at Chase Field

Monday in Arizona was the good version of this team. The Athletics stitched together 13 singles and two home runs in a 5-2 win — Kuroda-Grauer's first career homer, Jacob Wilson's sixth of the year, and a pinch-hit, two-run single from Jeff McNeil that capped a three-run seventh against Kevin Ginkel. Tommy White went 4-for-5, Jeffrey Springs handed off a manageable game, Luis Medina picked up the win in relief and Hogan Harris closed it out for his seventh save.

Tuesday was nearly the win of the season and instead became the most painful loss of it. Jack Perkins gave up three runs over five innings, including a first-inning, three-run homer to Max Kepler, and the A's trailed 4-2 with two outs in the ninth. Then Donovan Walton tripled and Wilson tied it with a two-run homer — this after Langeliers had gone deep in the eighth. Jonah Heim's sacrifice fly in the 10th put them up 5-4, but Medina walked two to load the bases, Nolan Arenado tied it, and Ildemaro Vargas slapped a bases-loaded single through the left side to end it, 6-5 Diamondbacks.

Wednesday's finale was over early. Arizona teed off for a 15-5 win behind Merrill Kelly, tagging Jump with his second rough outing of the week and handing the Athletics a second straight series loss along with a second double-digit blowout in six days. Thursday's off day and a quiet flight to Minneapolis were, mercifully, uneventful.

Ginn, Wilson and the Kids Worth Watching

Whatever the record says, there are real reasons to keep tabs on the Athletics this week and beyond, and most of them are young. Ginn is now 8-6 on a team 16 games under .500, and Saturday marked his second no-hit bid of six-plus innings this season — MLB.com notes he is just the fourth A's pitcher in the last 50 years with multiple such starts in one year. Wilson homered twice in two nights, including that two-out, game-tying shot in the ninth on Tuesday, the kind of at-bat that travels well beyond a lost season. Soderstrom went deep in back-to-back games to reach 16 homers, Langeliers carried 21 into the break as he builds on his breakout 2025, and Kuroda-Grauer packed a record-setting hit pace and a first career homer into a rookie month that ended in the strangest way possible (more on that below). The flip side: Springs is 3-9 with an ERA near six, and Perkins entered the week with one of the highest ERAs among qualified-ish starters in baseball. The rotation is a work in progress with occasional flashes of the future.

Where the Athletics Sit in the AL West

There is no sugarcoating the math. At 43-59, the Athletics are buried near the bottom of the AL West and playing out the second half for development rather than October — through Wednesday they had lost 12 of 14, and the home record at Sutter Health Park stood at 19-28 at the break. The bigger-picture story keeps moving, though. Crews installed the second steel roof truss on the club's roughly $2 billion Las Vegas ballpark on Tuesday, a reminder that this Sacramento chapter is a bridge, with a handful of 2027 home dates already earmarked for Las Vegas Ballpark before the permanent move. And with the Aug. 3 trade deadline approaching, expect the phones to ring: MLB Trade Rumors has listed the A's among the clubs with bullpen arms available to contenders, and veterans on movable deals are the obvious chips while Ginn, Wilson, Soderstrom and Langeliers look like the core worth keeping.

Injuries and Roster Moves

• Joshua Kuroda-Grauer landed on the 10-day injured list after undergoing surgery for a ruptured testicle suffered around Monday's win in Arizona — a brutal, fluky interruption to a sparkling first month in the majors.
• Mark Leiter Jr. went on the 15-day IL, retroactive to July 19, with a right hip impingement, thinning out the bullpen.
• Infielder Max Muncy — the A's 2021 first-rounder, not the Dodgers slugger — was recalled from Triple-A Las Vegas on Tuesday after adding outfield work to his portfolio with the Aviators.
• Right-hander Hayden Juenger was also recalled from Las Vegas to give the relief corps a fresh arm.

What's Next for the Athletics

The schedule offers a chance to build something modest before deadline noise takes over completely.

• Friday, July 24 at Minnesota, 8:10 p.m. ET — Jacob Lopez gets the ball opposite Zebby Matthews to open a weekend set at Target Field.
• Saturday, July 25 at Minnesota, 7:10 p.m. ET — the Twins counter with Joe Ryan, comfortably the toughest matchup of the series.
• Sunday, July 26 at Minnesota, 2:10 p.m. ET — Springs, still searching for traction at 3-9, draws Kendry Rojas in the finale.
• Monday through Thursday, July 27-30 — a four-game home set against Boston at Sutter Health Park, with Detroit arriving right around the deadline.

The Athletics this week were equal parts miserable and watchable, which has been the bargain in Sacramento all season. The record is not headed anywhere pleasant, but Ginn's emergence, Wilson's late-game nerve and Soderstrom's power give the second half a pulse — and the next stretch, with the Twins and Red Sox on the docket before the Aug. 3 deadline, will tell us which veterans finish the year in green and gold. Keep one eye on the box scores and the other on the transaction wire, because the most consequential Athletics news of the summer may still be a week away.