Jump takes a leap forward with career-high nine strikeouts

SAN FRANCISCO -- As impressive a start as Gage Jump has had to his Major League career, he still came away from each of his first five outings expecting more of himself in the strikeout department. After all, strikeouts were his bread and butter in the Minors and a big reason for his quick ascension to the Athletics.

On Wednesday night, the punchouts finally came in bunches. Making his sixth big league start, Jump, rated the A’s No. 3 prospect and No. 37 overall prospect in baseball by MLB Pipeline, registered a career high nine strikeouts as he shut down the Giants across five scoreless innings before the A’s were walked off in a 2-1 loss at Oracle Park.

Early in Jump's rookie campaign, he generated weak contact and pitched deep into games. The former remained true on Wednesday, as the 23-year-old left-hander lowered his ERA to 2.04 and made history by becoming just the third A’s pitcher in the Integration Era (since 1947) to not allow a home run in his first six career starts, joining Tim Conroy (1978-82) and Jim Archer (1961).

“I love the way he’s competing,” manager Mark Kotsay said of Jump before the game. “I love the way that he’s getting deep into games. Really, the only way you can do that is inducing soft contact and getting outs early in counts, all of which he’s been able to do in his time here. For me, that’s encouraging. He’ll learn how to strike people out. It’s harder to learn how to get outs than it is to learn how to strike people out.”

On Wednesday, Jump notched four of his strikeouts on his electric fastball, which topped out at 98.5 mph. The other five punchouts came on his slider and curveball, both considered plus secondary pitches in his arsenal.

The downside to Jump’s high-strikeout night was a quickly rising pitch count. He sat at 84 pitches through four innings and finished at 97 pitches through five, considerably less efficient than his 107 pitches through seven scoreless in his previous outing on Thursday against the Angels.

Part of that inefficiency was the product of a pesky Giants lineup, which fouled off 31 pitches against Jump.

“It was one of those outings where you have to battle,” Jump said. “They fouled a lot of pitches off. I think I can compete a little better with not throwing the same pitch over and over again and expecting a different result. But overall, I was happy with it.”

We’ve seen deep outings with fewer strikeouts from Jump and now shorter outings with more punchouts. There is a way to mesh that together to achieve both long outings and high strikeout totals, and that’s what Jump is ultimately striving for.

“Strikeouts are cool,” Jump said. “I like striking people out. But if it takes eight, nine, 10 pitches to do so, it’s frustrating. My previous outings, I wasn’t striking as many people out, but I was going six and seven innings. I’m trying to stay even-keeled with it. Looking back on those last couple of outings, I’m seeing the differences of quicker at-bats, quicker counts and finishing batters faster.”

There is a next level, and the A’s believe he can reach it. As it stands now, the young southpaw is already looking the part of a frontline starter for a club that desperately needs one.

“Looking at every single [start] as a whole, seeing my execution charts and count coverage, that’s kind of what I focus on,” Jump said. “Tonight, I was falling behind [in counts] a good bit. They were trying to jump to the heater. … There’s still things I need to clean up. I was happy with it. But I wish I could go a little bit deeper.”

Jump is trending up, but the A’s continued trending down. After Elvis Alvarado was unable to hold a one-run lead in the ninth by surrendering a pair of back-breaking homers, including a walk-off to Victor Bericoto, the A’s have lost four straight and six of their last eight to fall a season-low four games under .500 (38-42).