A’s mount late comeback to get series win from El Dorado

It was just how A's pitcher Dillon Griffin drew it up in the press box Thursday at Cavalier Field. Drama. Late inning comeback. No doubt.
    Ninth inning home runs from left fielder Matt Keys and second baseman Tyler Robbins gave the A's a thrilling 12-10 win over the El Dorado Broncos and a series win against the Jayhawk League opponent.
    "It was a first pitch fastball," Keys said of his homer that tied the game with one out in the ninth. "I was just sitting on it, waiting on it."
    Keys added that sometimes pitchers underestimate a hitter of his size (5 feet, 10 inches, 170 lbs.) in the eighth slot in the lineup and count on their fastball to put the smaller hitter away. El Dorado reliever Harrison Kuroda made the mistake that several A's opponents have and Keys made him pay for it in a key moment.
    When Robbins stepped up, center fielder Cameron Monger was aboard after a triple that El Dorado outfielders Jamie Armendariz and Matt Koch had misplayed, and the scene was set. Robbins, however, was 0-for his last-13 at bats.
    Kuroda repeated the mistake he made once already in the inning, and Robbins broke his slump with a walk-off two-run shot to left-center field.
    "I had been struggling, and I was just looking for something I could handle, to get the runner in," Robbins said. "I think I found it."
    What started as a promising evening turned sluggish in the middle innings for the A's as they saw a 3-1 lead turn into a 10-5 deficit before their offensive explosion in the last three innings.
    Shortstop Travis Meiners and designated hitter Chris Ciesla drove in one run apiece to get the lead 2-1 in the first inning. A Chad Daleiden error brought home A's third baseman Oscar Sigala to make the score 3-1 in the third.
    But starting pitcher Eric Holmes struggled to find the strike zone, and only lasted five innings.
    "E was not on his form tonight, and that's going to happen," A's head coach Phil Stephenson said. "But he battled and kept us in it."
    But the Broncos came to life in the fourth frame and tallied four runs off two homers and scored in every inning until the ninth. Dodge mounted its first comeback attempt in the seventh, when first baseman Adam Hamilton doubled in Meiners and Ciesla to pull the A's to within 3 runs.
    Dodge City reliever Kevin Ginorio gave back two runs when Bronco left fielder Matt Koch homered in the eighth, but the A's somehow produced three more in the bottom to make up for it. If two-out hits get you to heaven, Robbins, Meiners and Ciesla all have corner offices for their work in the bottom of the eighth.
    The win takes the A’s to an 8-16 record in Jayhawk League play. They will take on the Joplin Slashers in the first game of a three-game series today at 7 p.m. at Cavalier field.