The Athletics are one of MLB's worst teams — and it shows.
In a game against the Angels on Wednesday afternoon, Oakland shortstop Max Schuemann laced a double to left center field to bring in two runners standing up, without a throw, to put them up 2-0 in the second inning. Or so everyone thought.
While catcher Kyle McCann was on his way to home plate — with no chance of being thrown out — he stumbled a little bit. Then, he overstepped home plate.
As he was doing so, his teammate Armando Alvarez grabbed him and pushed him back to the bag in order to officially record the run.
But doing so is illegal.
Because Alvarez — in the on-deck circle — touched an eligible runner, runner's interference was called and McCann was automatically ruled out. That's on a play where the relay throw barely reached the infield by the time McCann should've touched home.
Strange play here in the second inning. Oakland's Kyle McCann missed home plate and his teammate Armando Alvarez grabbed him to tell him to go back and touch home. But McCann is ruled out because of the contact with Alvarez. It was upheld after a review. #Angels down 1-0. pic.twitter.com/N7Y3oBR6OT
— Rhett Bollinger (@RhettBollinger) June 26, 2024
With two outs, the play automatically ended the inning. The A's had a chance to tack on more runs with Schuemann in scoring position.
Instead, the game remained 1-0. The A's closed as roughly +100 underdogs to win this matchup. Their run line was priced at about +1.5 (-190), with the total priced at 8.5.
All of those lines, of course, have been compromised. Some may rejoice at the end of this contest. Others will remember it as a bad beat of a lifetime.
