SEATTLE -- Coming off an outing he deemed “weak” and “not acceptable” in Texas earlier this week, Gage Jump was determined to come out Sunday afternoon and show who he really is when things get tough on the mound.
Jump was clearly a better pitcher in Sunday’s series finale against the Mariners. He struck out seven batters and did not issue a walk. All but 22 of his 82 pitches went for strikes. Yet by the end of it, he was pulled after four innings -- even earlier than that previous start of 4 1/3 frames and a career-high seven runs allowed against the Rangers -- despite allowing just two runs in a 2-0 loss at T-Mobile Park.
Early on, there wasn’t much difference in the way Jump was pitching from his counterpart, Bryan Woo. Both were efficient through three scoreless innings, with Jump seemingly spotting his electric fastball -- which maxed out at 99.5 mph -- wherever he wanted.
But while Woo went on to dominate across eight scoreless frames, the A’s rookie hit a wall in the fourth.
Facing the heart of Seattle’s order, Jump reached quick 0-2 counts on Dominic Canzone, Julio Rodríguez and Cal Raleigh to start the inning. All three ended up with singles to push across the game’s first run. Next up was J.P. Crawford, who reached a 2-2 count before lining an RBI single to center. Then came a single from Josh Naylor, making it five straight hits to begin the frame and loading the bases with no outs.
With Jump up to 28 pitches in the inning and with no outs recorded, manager Mark Kotsay was about ready to pull the plug as he called down to the bullpen for Seth Johnson to start getting loose. From here, Jump locked in, striking out Weston Wilson, Michael Arroyo and Jhonny Pereda in order on fastballs to limit the damage.
It was an impressive escape job for Jump, but the 43-pitch inning spelled the end to his outing.
“It’s pretty remarkable that he got through that inning only giving up two runs,” Kotsay said. “He had a lot of guys with two strikes, just couldn’t finish and execute the pitch. But again, bases loaded with nobody out and you strike out the side, that says a lot about the competitor. He showed a lot of maturity and growth.”
Jump did take some solace in his ability to dig deep and get out of the fourth without it spiraling out of control. At the same time, he was perplexed by how it all unfolded. Of his 43 pitches that inning, 32 went for strikes. But the Mariners fouled off 15 of those pitches and notched four of their five hits in two-strike counts.
“That’s just super frustrating,” Jump said. “I got into those good counts and should have been able to put them away or gotten some kind of weak contact. I don’t know. I’ll go back and look at where those pitches were at. It just sucks.”
Jump has flashed the dominant stuff that made him an MLB Pipeline Top 100 prospect in each of his starts this season, including this one. The A’s continue to believe the 23-year-old left-hander will emerge as a frontline starter for them.
Right now, however, that inability to finish off hitters is a common theme early in Jump’s career. His 106 strikeouts are now the fourth most in franchise history by an A’s pitcher through their first 19 career games -- trailing only former aces in Tim Hudson (122), Barry Zito (115) and Sonny Gray (107) -- yet he carries a 5.12 ERA through those 19 starts.
“It’s just really frustrating coming out of a game again after four innings,” Jump said. “I’ll try to make some adjustments. But with two strikes, I just can’t give up hits like that. … I was happy with the first three innings. I put the ball where I wanted it to go and was mixing a little bit. But somehow it all fell apart in the fourth.”
The A’s went down quietly against Woo to fall short of a four-game sweep in Seattle, but they do head back home 4-3 from a seven-game road trip against the Rangers and Mariners, now set to host the Blue Jays on Monday for the start of a three-game set.