A's pounce on Tigers in series opener

DETROIT -- Having lost 11 of their last 12 games on the road and entering the day an American League-worst 5-15 away from the Oakland Coliseum, the A’s arrived at Comerica Park with a certain frustration that built up over the past couple of weeks. That frustration was unleashed on the Tigers.

The A’s offense exploded for a season-high run total in Thursday afternoon's 17-3 victory. It was their 13th consecutive win against the Tigers and the eighth in a row at Comerica Park.

• Box score

“I think the whole vibe from the team this morning was that we were pretty worn out,” A’s catcher Josh Phegley said. “We had an off-day that didn’t really feel like an off-day from a night game, getting up early to get on a plane all day and having an early game today. We almost had a chip on our shoulder. And to come out and put the game away early, I think that was some flashes of the confidence we’ve had in the past.”

Jurickson Profar slugged his first career grand slam in the third off Tigers starter Spencer Turnbull, the first of a season-high-tying five home runs on the day. Yet the most impressive performance may have come on the mound.

Pitching in front of a large group of friends and family who made the one-hour drive from his hometown of Toledo, Ohio, Chris Bassitt continued his impressive start to the year with his strongest outing this season. The right-hander held Detroit scoreless over a career-high eight innings, allowing only four hits and two walks with seven strikeouts.

Sitting at 105 pitches through eight innings, A’s manager Bob Melvin sensed a bit of fatigue from Bassitt. Though he would have liked to see him toss the first complete game of his career, Melvin chose not to push it -- given that Bassitt is three years removed from Tommy John surgery on his right elbow -- and instead gave the ball to Aaron Brooks, who allowed a three-run homer to Dawel Lugo in the ninth that prevented what would have been the A’s largest shutout victory in franchise history.

Bassitt has allowed three earned runs or fewer in each of his five starts, lowering his ERA to 1.93. More important for a club that has played extra innings in four of its last nine games has been Bassitt’s length. He’s tossed at least seven innings in three of those five outings.

“He’s getting deep into games,” Melvin said. “It’s important when you go through stretches like we have to give the bullpen a rest. He did that.”

Phegley the All-Star?

After driving in four runs on Thursday, including a two-run blast in the sixth, Phegley now leads all AL catchers with 26 RBIs. He’s particularly gone on a rampage away from the Coliseum, as he’s hit all five of his homers and is batting .386 with 23 RBIs in road games.

Hitting at the bottom of the order for most of the season, Phegley’s production provides the A's with depth throughout the lineup.

“If you’re looking at All-Star-worthy catchers at this point, I don’t know anyone that is more worthy than he is,” Melvin said of Phegley. “He continues to have big games. You look up, he’s hitting close to .300. That kind of production from the nine-hole is rare.”

The offensive outbreak comes as a surprise to many, but Phegley's battery mate on Thursday has known he has been capable of this for years.

Bassitt and Phegley’s relationship goes back to 2011, when both were in the White Sox organization before getting traded to the A’s in '15. Over that time, Bassitt had seen the catcher put up big numbers on offense, but he’s just never had a full opportunity to translate them to the Majors, with veterans like Jonathan Lucroy and Stephen Vogt blocking him in the past. Now, seemingly having locked down the starting spot after beginning the year in a platoon role with Nick Hundley, Phegley is beginning to shine.

“The offense has always been there,” Bassitt said. “It’s hard to be a backup catcher and hit, near impossible. But when he won the everyday job, I told people that him hitting 20 home runs is zero percent out of the question, and his defense has always been there. Every time I’ve seen him play every day, he’s always hit. He’s proving to everyone that he deserves to be the everyday guy.”

Beating the shift

For the second time in the span of a week, Matt Olson beat the shift by bunting his way aboard, as he placed one perfectly down the third-base line in the first inning. Both bunts have come with just one strike in the count, which could eventually force defenses to revert back to traditional positioning.

“As long as I’m grounding out to short right field and lining out to that guy over there, I’m going to keep trying to put bunts down,” Olson said. “As long as they’re giving it to me, it’s a free hit.”

Of course, there are other ways to get around the shift, as Olson showed in the sixth with an opposite-field solo homer off Blaine Hardy, putting the A’s ahead by nine.

Olson was moved up to the No. 3 spot in the lineup by Melvin in an effort to change things up, as the club looked for a spark following a three-game losing streak. The move doesn’t change Olson’s approach at the plate per se, but he knows pitchers are likely to pitch him differently having slugger Khris Davis waiting behind him in the cleanup spot.

Regardless of where he hits on Friday, the offensive outburst on Thursday was something Olson said was much-needed.

“I think the timing of it was great for us,” Olson said. “Hopefully it sparks a run. We’ve kind of been having bad at-bats lately and that’s been contagious. A couple of hits start coming out and it seems like everybody was having good at-bats.”

What’s better than platinum?

It’s easy to forget about defense when you score a barrage of runs and get a lights-out performance from your starter, but Matt Chapman’s two defensive gems on Thursday did not go unnoticed by his teammates.

Playing the shift with a runner on first and two outs, Chapman hustled over from the shortstop position for a slow chopper on the infield by Niko Goodrum. He fired a missile to Olson for a close play at first in which Goodrum was originally ruled safe, but it was overturned on a challenge by the A’s to help Bassitt get out of the inning.

“Chapman being Chapman,” Bassitt said. “He made two or three plays today where it was like, 'You might as well give him the Platinum Glove Award already.' There’s nobody better than him in the AL. It’s unbelievable.”

The other perhaps more important play came in the second inning.

After Ronny Rodriguez put himself in scoring position with a one-out triple, Chapman smoothly picked a grounder by Josh Harrison and fired the ball to Phegley to get Rodriguez at the plate. It may seem irrelevant in a 17-3 blowout, but the game was scoreless at the time, and Chapman’s smart play prevented a momentum shift.

“He’s got the arm strength and shows it off a lot,” Phegley said. “That was a big play. A triple is not a good way to start the inning, and we cut that run down.”