Springs flirts with no-no and didn't even know it (or what inning it was)

NEW YORK – When a pitcher carries a no-hitter late into a game, there comes a point when he starts to piece together what is happening in real time.

Not only did Athletics starter Jeffrey Springs not know he had held the Yankees hitless through the first six innings of Thursday’s 1-0 victory at Yankee Stadium, he lost track of what inning he was in.

“I honestly didn’t realize what inning it was,” Springs said. “I was an inning behind for some reason. I didn’t realize the no-hitter. … I was just going one pitch at a time and trying to stay in the moment as much as possible.”

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Springs was locked in. So much so that it wasn’t until A’s trainer Jeff Collins went out to check on him in the seventh after his foot landed awkwardly on the mound following a pitch to Cody Bellinger that the left-hander looked up at the scoreboard and recognized both the correct inning and the ‘0’ in the Yankees’ hit column.

“I was just trying to get one out, two out, three outs and then reset and do it again,” Springs said. “Trying to be efficient and get quick outs to go as deep as possible in the game.”

Quick outs were exactly what he got all afternoon. And while his bid for the 14th no-hitter in A’s history was spoiled with one out in the seventh on a single by Ben Rice, Springs nonetheless dazzled yet again in what has been an impressive start to his 2026 campaign with seven shutout innings as he held New York’s potent offense to one hit and two walks with six strikeouts.

The changeup has always been Springs’ bread and butter. On Thursday, he utilized it as the putaway pitch on three of his strikeouts and generated five of his 14 total whiffs with it. He was also consistently ahead in the count, throwing first-pitch strikes to 17 of his 25 batters faced.

Springs’ overall success, however, came in his ability to mix up his five-pitch arsenal. First time through the Yankees’ lineup, Springs utilized his fastball 57% of the time. His usage rate switched up drastically after that, leaning more heavily on his slider the second and third time through the order.

“With a lineup like that, you have to be able to mix and move early and often,” Springs said. “I feel like I was able to do that with the fastball and just enough breaking balls to keep them off-balance.”

Springs carried an extra bit of excitement this Spring Training. Before the 2025 season, he was both adjusting to a new team after getting traded from the Rays and also going through his first “normal” offseason back from Tommy John surgery. This year, Springs had the comfort of familiarity with the A’s, as well being further removed from the surgery and having gone through a full, healthy regular season.

The “stuff” and the mechanics were in a much better place for Springs entering 2026. He has shown that so far as the best pitcher in this A’s rotation, now 2-0 with a 1.47 ERA through his first three starts.

“He’s feeling really confident right now,” manager Mark Kotsay said of Springs. “Coming out of Spring Training, I felt like the ball was coming out of his hand really well. There was just a different guy from last year to this year who walked in.”

The A’s appear to be a much more confident group in general as of late. After a slow start that saw them drop season-opening series to the Blue Jays and Braves, they’ve now bounced back with consecutive series wins against the Astros and Yankees.

Thursday’s series finale was the A’s first 1-0 win over the Yankees since April 25, 1979, and the series victory marked their first at Yankee Stadium since 2016. Throughout it, the A’s received timely clutch hits, including Max Muncy’s first career triple in the seventh on Thursday to set up the game-winning run, and a lockdown bullpen effort in the final two games, with Hogan Harris notching his first save of the year Thursday, one day after Joel Kuhnel recorded his first save since 2022.

“We talk a lot about the character of the ballclub,” Kotsay said. “To come into New York, lose a tough first game and fight these two games and come out with a series win, these guys are really coming together as a group, and it’s showing out there on the field.”