BALTIMORE -- The Athletics are returning home from a six-game East Coast trip still holding the AL West lead, but possibly staring at an IL stint for their All-Star shortstop.
Jacob Wilson exited in the fifth inning of Sunday’s 2-1 loss to the Orioles in a Camden Yards series finale after a left shoulder sprain that came while diving to field Gunnar Henderson’s infield single.
Manager Mark Kotsay didn’t immediately have a timetable yet for the 24-year-old former first-round draft pick, who was wearing a sling on his left arm in the clubhouse postgame.
“We’ll have more imaging tomorrow and have further details on the timeline for him,” Kotsay said. “Any time you’re put in that situation where you make a great play but it results in an injury, it’s kind of tough, you know. But that’s the way Jacob plays the game. He plays it hard.”
Wilson tracked Henderson’s ground ball up the middle, laying out at full stretch to glove it in the shallow outfield grass behind second base.
He had no play regardless, but Wilson immediately grimaced in pain while corralling the grounder and, once to his feet, appeared to be favoring something on his left upper body.
Kotsay and team medical personnel paid a visit before deciding to lift him for Darell Hernaiz in a straight swap.
“He’s been huge, he’s our everyday shortstop,” said A’s catcher Shea Langeliers of Wilson, who finished Sunday 1-for-2. “Hopefully it’s not bad. Like I said, we need him in the lineup every day.”
The loss completed a 3-3 trip that will have the A’s returning home with a 21-19 record at the 40-game mark and a two-game advantage over the Rangers.
Luis Severino (2-4, 4.07 ERA) took a hard-luck loss, pitching 5 1/3 innings while being outdueled by the Orioles’ Chris Bassitt, who allowed only Zack Gelof’s early sacrifice fly in six innings of four-hit ball to back up opener Keegan Akin.
“That’s vintage Bass today,” Kotsay said of the O’s veteran righty. “He didn’t make any mistakes. He mixed his pitches from 69 to 93 [mph]. He knows how to pitch. He’s pitched in big games. I think that’s why Baltimore targeted him.”
Baltimore tied it on Henderson’s infield single in the third and went ahead on Dylan Beavers’ single to chase Severino in the sixth.
The A’s came closest to tying in the seventh when Leody Taveras’ on-line throw from center field arrived in time to retire Carlos Cortes trying to score from second on Gelof’s single.
In the eighth, Nick Kurtz extended his MLB-best on-base streak to 34 games with the first of two walks before Brent Rooker struck out and Tyler Soderstrom flew to right. Kurtz’s mark is now the fifth-longest single-season streak by an A's player in the past 40 years behind: Mark McGwire, 48 games (1996); Jason Giambi, 39 (1998); Jason Giambi, 39 (1997); Nick Swisher, 36 (2006).
Severino allowed six hits, walked four and had two men still aboard when he was pulled for Justin Sterner. Sterner walked Weston Wilson to load the bases before escaping with strikeouts of Blaze Alexander and Henderson.
Severino threw 61 of 102 pitches for strikes in his fourth-straight outing allowing two runs or fewer. The powerful righty lamented those walks, though, particularly a fifth-inning pass to Blaze Alexander that created a difficult frame and probably shortened his afternoon.
“I think that’s the biggest issue,” Severino said. “I need to just be better in those situations. With two outs, I can’t walk a right-hander in the bottom of the lineup.”
Wilson’s early exit continued a tough series for the 24-year-old.
In Saturday’s 6-2 win, he went 0-for-5 with three strikeouts in a performance that halted a 12-game hitting streak. On the first two strikeouts, he used up both of the Athletics’ ABS challenges on called third strikes that were upheld.