– by Adesina O. Koiki
A Lot of Sports Talk editor-in-chief
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BALTIMORE — Brent Rooker hopes to stay around in the Major Leagues longer than the brief cups of coffee that he has had in his short, yet peripatetic career, and the last couple of nights surely goes a long way in making sure he sticks around in the show.
Carlos Pérez got his second go-round at Major League Baseball after four years away from the show, and he quickly is making up for lost time.
Both Rooker and Pérez both had multi-hit games and each hit a home run, helping to lead the Athletics to an 8-4 victory over the Baltimore Orioles inside Camden Yards on Wednesday evening. Starting pitcher Ken Waldichuk pitched into the seventh inning and allowed just three runs, while Oakland’s three-run rally in the eighth inning broke a 4-4 tie.
Rooker, who spent two seasons in Minnesota before splitting time between San Diego and Kansas City last season, had played only 81 games combined in those three seasons, and earned a position on the Athletics’ roster with a productive spring training. After a 2-for-4 game last night, Rooker smacked a three-run home run in the first inning off Baltimore starter Dean Kremer to start the scoring.
Pérez, who last played in the Majors in 2018 before being out of the league from 2019 onward, also earned a spot on the roster in spring training, and in just is seventh at-bat of the season, also homered off of Kremer, coming in the fifth inning, to give the Athletics a 4-2 lead.
Pérez’s RBI single in the eighth inning capped a three-run rally in the eighth inning that broke a 4-4 tie.
Baltimore, which came back from a 7-3 deficit on Tuesday by scoring nine unanswered runs, came back from a 4-2 deficit tonight with two runs in the seventh inning. Cedric Mullins and Adley Rutschman each came up with run-scoring singles to tie the game, with Rutschman’s coming with two outs off of A’s reliever Jeurys Familia.
*Editor’s note: Above the byline is the photo gallery from Wednesday evening’s contest, with all photos taken by DC-area photographer Phillip Peters. After clicking on the first photo to enlarge the picture, make sure to press the left and right arrow buttons to scroll through the rest of the pictures. There are 39 pictures in total.
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