ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Shea Langeliers hit three home runs, including a two-run drive in the ninth inning that lifted the Oakland Athletics over the Texas Rangers 4-3 on Tuesday night.
Langeliers, a 26-year-old who entered with 29 career big league homers, hit solo drives in the second off Nathan Eovaldi and in the seventh against David Robertson.
“It feels good to get something like that when you’re seeing the ball that good,” said Langeliers, who attended nearby Keller High and played about 100 miles south of Globe Life Field at Baylor.
On the winning homer, he said he was “just trying to be aggressive in the middle of the plate.”
The A’s have won three of their last four games, improving to 4-7.
“We’re kind of playing relaxed and free right now, just going out there and giving it all we’ve got and seeing what happens,” Langeliers said.
Last season, Oakland’s fourth win the A’s at 4-16 on April 21 en route to a franchise-worst 50-112 record.
“We’ve played better baseball since the start of the season, when we kind of got off to an unnerving start,” manager Mark Kotsay said.
The World Series champion Rangers (6-5) are on their first losing streak of the season, at three games.
“We ran into a guy that just had a huge night,” manager Bruce Bochy said.
Texas led 3-2 in the ninth when Seth Brown walked with one out off José Leclerc (0-2) and Langeliers sent a first-pitch fastball to left-center for his fourth home run this season.
It was the first three-homer game for Langeliers, who hit a pair on Oct. 2, 2022, at Seattle and last Aug. 23 at the Chicago White Sox. The only other starting A’s catcher to hit three homers in a game was Mickey Cochrane in 1925.
Langeliers tied the score 1-1 when he homered on a splitter from Eovaldi and 2-2 when he connected on a knuckle-split from Robertson, who was pitching on his 39th birthday.
Michael Kelly (1-0) threw a perfect eighth inning, and Mason Miller pitched a perfect 1-2-3 ninth for Oakland’s first save this season.
Texas went ahead when Marcus Semien doubled on the first pitch from Alex Wood and Josh Smith hit an RBI single on Wood’s sixth.
Jonah Heim homered in the second and Evan Carter in the seventh against Mitch Spence.
Wood left with a calf cramp following four innings.
Rangers All-Star shortstop Corey Seager was given his second game off this season. Seager missed much of spring training after undergoing sports hernia surgery in late January.
TRAINER’S ROOM
A’s: INF Ryan Noda was scratched from the starting lineup after taking a pitch off his left hand during early batting practice. X-rays were negative, and Noda is day to day.
Rangers: 1B Nathaniel Lowe (right oblique strain), who hasn’t played this season, could begin a rehab assignment this weekend.
UP NEXT
Wednesday night’s middle game of the series will match area products on the mound. A’s RHP Ross Stripling (0-2, 3.75 ERA) is a graduate of Southlake Carroll High who lives in Granbury. Rangers LHP Cody Bradford (2-0, 2.13), from Aledo, will try to win three consecutive starts for the first time in his two-year big league career.
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