Clase blows save as Cleveland loses 5-4

Emmanuel Clase gave up a walk-off two-run homer to Jed Lowrie as the Cleveland Baseball Club lost by a score of 5-4 in Oakland.

Not a great start to the second half of the season for Emmanuel Clase. The Cleveland Baseball Club reliever came on in the 9th to close the game and promptly allowed the game-tying run to reach four pitches in. After inducing a line out to potentially set up a game-ending double-play, Jed Lowrie came to the plate and hit a walk-off two-run home run to hand Cleveland the loss. It was the fourth blown save of the season for Clase as he only threw a total of eight pitches in this outing.

Cleveland was in a position to win due to a competent start from Eli Morgan and some timely home runs from surprising sources. Morgan would allow three runs on seven hits while striking out six and walking one in his 5 innings of work. Phil Maton, Bryan Shaw, and James Karinchak would all keep the Athletics off the scoreboard for the following three innings before Clase’s less than stellar performance.

Half of the runs for Cleveland came on solo home runs from Roberto Perez, his sixth of the season, and Bradley Zimmer with his first of the year. The other two runs came on a Franmil Reyes RBI single and a sacrifice fly from Harold Ramirez.

With the loss Cleveland is still 8 game back of the division leading Chicago White Sox while the gap between themselves and Oakland grew to 5.5 games. Decision time is rapidly approaching for the Cleveland Baseball Club with a minor selloff the most likely scenario.