OAKLAND -- The A’s were in dire need of a strong outing from one of their starting pitchers, and Chris Bassitt delivered.

Making his 2019 debut, Bassitt was sharp as he shut down the Rangers over five scoreless innings in Monday’s 6-1 victory at Oakland Coliseum, which snapped the A’s three-game losing streak.

A’s starting pitchers had combined for only 11 innings pitched over the previous three games, leaving the bullpen to cover 16 frames in that stretch. Bassitt did not go as deep into the game as he would have liked, due to a pitch count of 92 after five innings, but he’ll take the quality of the outing over the quantity.

“I guess you could say I was effectively wild,” said Bassitt, who walked four batters and hit another. “I was trying to fill the zone up with everything and hope for the best. I didn’t have great control tonight but threw all I could at them.”

A’s manager Bob Melvin would rather see his starters limit the walks, but in Bassitt’s case, the randomness on the location of his pitches may have actually benefited him as Rangers hitters had a tough time gauging what the right-hander might throw at them at any given moment.

“He can walk guys, hit guys, go 3-0 and come back for a strikeout,” Melvin said. “It’s really tough to figure out where he is going to throw a ball.”

Bassitt often pitched with traffic on the basepaths with only one clean inning, but he avoided any real trouble as he allowed only two hits and notched seven strikeouts, his highest total since he struck out 10 on Aug. 9, 2015.

The original goal for Bassitt coming into the night was to go at least seven innings to help save a taxed bullpen. He adjusted that goal about two innings into his start.

“I kind of messed up because I came in thinking I have to eat innings and the first two innings I look up and I have 40-something pitches,” said Bassitt, who started in place of the injured Marco Estrada (lumbar strain). “It turned into just throwing the kitchen sink at them and putting up as many zeros as I can.”

With offspeed pitches that he threw as low as 68 mph, combined with a fastball clocked as fast as 95 mph, Bassitt’s variation in pitch speeds have brought him a new confidence on the mound. It’s one that has taken a while to develop.

Bassitt was always a power pitcher as a prospect coming up through the Minor Leagues, but Tommy John surgery in 2016 left him struggling to get that velocity back to where it once was. Even in '18, when he pitched well for Oakland with a 3.02 ERA over 11 games, something felt off to him. On Monday night, for the first time in a Major League game since the surgery, Bassitt felt like his old self again.

“To say this is the best I’ve felt is an understatement,” Bassitt said. “My velocity is back, everything is kind of back. Yeah, I’m back.”

Stephen Piscotty provided Bassitt with an early lead by belting a home run off Rangers starter Mike Minor in the second, his fourth of the year, to put the A’s ahead, 1-0. It was the first lead the A’s had held in 27 innings, when they went ahead 1-0 in Friday’s loss to the Blue Jays.

“That’s where you want to be,” Piscotty said of taking the early lead. “We were doing that all last year, get a lead early and the bullpen comes in and shuts them down. It was a tough stretch the last couple of games, but we’re going to get that back.”

It was a three-RBI night for Piscotty, who also drove in runs on a sacrifice fly in the sixth and a single in the eighth that resulted in an extra run scoring on an error by Delino DeShields.

“He had really good swings in batting practice,” Melvin said. “Not that that really means anything, but going into the game, he had a pretty good feeling and looked good every time up.”

Fernando Rodney made history as he finished the game with a scoreless ninth inning, marking his 907th career appearance and moving him past Cy Young for 24th on the all-time career appearances list.

“That’s pretty cool stuff,” Melvin said. “Cy Young, that’s a big name.”

Trouble with the curve

Bassitt showed off a Bugs Bunny-like curveball which sat between 68-71 mph and produced plenty of off-balance swing-and-misses throughout the night, including two in the fifth inning that struck out Delino DeShields and Elvis Andrus.

It’s a pitch that came in handy quite often during his Major League success in 2018. Opposing batters hit just .111 against his curveball last year.

"It’s a real slow curveball,” Melvin said. “He can slow you down and speed you up.”

Profar shines on defense

Entering the night leading all Major League second basemen with five errors, Jurickson Profar had a night on defense that could lend him some confidence going forward.

He made a highlight-reel diving catch in the second inning to rob Logan Forsythe of a base hit and another diving stop on a hard grounder by Danny Santana the next inning to take away another hit.

“I think that may have been his best defensive game this year,” Bassitt said. “He had some great highlights for me.”

“It’s just playing the position more,” Melvin said. “Last year, he was mostly on the other side of the diamond. That’s always a little bit of a transition for a guy that is asked to play everywhere. The more he plays at second, the more comfortable he will get.”