A's more than ready for much-needed All-Star break

CHICAGO – The All-Star break is upon us, and no team in baseball needs it more than the Athletics right now.

Battered and bruised over the past few weeks both from an injury and record standpoint, the A’s (41-55) closed out the season’s unofficial first half with a 9-1 loss to the White Sox on Sunday afternoon at Rate Field, completing a three-game sweep. They’ve dropped nine in a row – the longest active losing streak in MLB – and entered the break having lost 17 of their past 20 games.

“It’s been a really tough stretch,” All-Star catcher Shea Langeliers said. “Collectively as a group, it couldn’t have been better timing to get away from the game and not think about baseball for a while. Just go home, relax and be with your family. Get away, reset, come back and we’ll put it together in the second half.”

The dreadful stretch to end the first half was capped by a winless six-game road trip in which the A’s scored just six runs. It was the first time the A’s have scored six runs or fewer in a six-game span since scoring six from May 4-10, 2022. Before that, the previous instance happened in 1978, when they scored five runs in six games from Sept. 13-17.

This 20-game freefall has had an obvious effect in the standings. Since this 3-17 stretch that began on June 20 – the worst record in baseball during that span – this playoff-aspiring A’s club has gone from second place in the American League West and only a half-game out of first place to fourth place in the division at 8 games back and 6 1/2 games back of the third AL Wild Card spot.

“It’s been tough, in all facets, really,” manager Mark Kotsay said. “The break couldn’t come at a better time. … We’ll clear our minds, come back and start over. We’d like to be closer in the division than we are. We haven’t killed ourselves through this, but we’ve definitely made it more challenging, for sure.”

A brutal bout with the injury bug hasn’t helped. The A’s currently have seven players on the injured list, including key players such as Zack Gelof, Denzel Clarke and Opening Day starter Luis Severino.

The biggest losses, though, are Brent Rooker, the club’s unquestioned leader who was lost for the season last month due to a knee injury that required surgery, and reigning American League Rookie of the Year Nick Kurtz, who went down this week with a thumb injury that will prevent him from playing in his first All-Star Game.

“I’ve talked about Kurtz, since he first got here as an alpha and a guy in that locker room that holds people accountable,” Kotsay said. “Rooker’s presence is the same. If I had to put a captain out there, it would be Rook. You feel the void of not having him here. But we’ll get through this.”

You can’t help but draw parallels to the ugly 1-20 stretch the A’s went through last season from late May into early June, which matched the worst 21-game stretch in franchise history. It felt like the end of the world at the time, but the A’s did eventually bounce back from that. In fact, their 35-29 (.547) record after the All-Star break last year ranked in the top 10 in the Majors.

Last year’s turnaround is what gives this A’s team hope that they can turn a corner.

“It’s kind of like our track record,” Langeliers said. “For whatever reason, we’ve been a second-half team. … Just kind of seems like we come back from the break and put it all together. This last stretch before the break, we’ve been grinding. It feels like nothing is going our way right now.”

Langeliers warmed up for his first All-Star Game by launching his 21st homer – a solo shot to left in the first – to give the A’s an early 1-0 advantage that was the first lead they’d held in a game since July 1. But that lead quickly evaporated in the bottom half as starter J.T. Ginn surrendered a leadoff homer to Sam Antonacci and was tagged for six runs in the opening frame.

At this point, the A’s just need a win. Their next chance will come Friday when they return home to West Sacramento for the start of a three-game series against the Nationals.

“We’re pressing to get a win,” Kotsay said. “Everyone knows that. We recognize it. I think the four days off will clear everybody’s mindset and reset.”