Zito helps A’s beat Angels, 8-7

ANAHEIM, Calif. _ Barry Zito’s farewell tour has apparently come to an end, conclusively, in the A’s 8-7 win over the Angels on Wednesday.tmpplchld And while the 37-year-old left-hander didn’t get the win, he made a healthy contribution of what was just the A’s eighth win in 27 September games.tmpplchld Zito, for all purposes retired as of two weeks ago, pitched the first four innings for Oakland against the Angels, giving up two solo homers but using three double plays to pitch out of more dangerous situations.tmpplchld He threw 76 pitches through four innings, holding a 3-2 lead. Although the lefty would have needed a fifth inning to quality for the win, manager Bob Melvin decided Zito, who had not thrown more than two innings in a game since August, had gone as far as he was going to go.tmpplchld Perhaps helping to make Melvin’s mind up was the specter of Mike Trout due to bat third in the fifth inning for the Angels. Trout had walked and hit his 41st homer in his first two at-bats and was 4-for-4 lifetime against Zito.tmpplchld The fifth inning went as planed as Daniel Coulombe and Dan Otero turned the Angels away, but a three-run sixth, punctuated by a two-run homer from Johnny Giavotella off Edward Mujica, seemingly had the Angels back on the way to a sweep of the series.tmpplchld Losers of four in succession and nine of their last 10, the A’s had different plans, for once, although they got some help from Giavotella’s defensive replacement at second base. Taylor Featherston’s error got the A’s going and Oakland went on to load the bases on a pinch-hit single from Coco Crisp and a pinch-hit walk from Billy Butler.tmpplchld Mark Canha’s pop fly single produced one run, and when Josh Reddick walked, the game was tied at 5-all. With two out, Stephen Vogt, held to just one RBI for the month of September, drilled a tiebreaking two-run single off Trevor Gott to push the A’s back in front.tmpplchld The A’s would stretch the lead to 8-5 but solo homers from Carlos Perez in the eighth off Ryan Dull and Kole Calhoun in the ninth off Sean Doolittle cut the lead to one run. Doolittle hung to earn his third save, needing 49 pitches to do it.tmpplchld For Zito, the start was almost certainly the last one in a 15-year career that saw him win both a World Series ring with the Giants in 2012 and the Cy Young Award with the A’s in 2002. He’d been at home after spending the entire season at Triple-A Nashville when an ongoing spate of pitching injuries led the A’s to ask him to join them.tmpplchld He pitched once in relief, then on Saturday made what he thought was going to be his final start, pitching in Oakland against former A’s teammate Tim Hudson, now with the Giants. Zito got just six outs that time. On Wednesday he was able to double that to 12 thanks in large part to three double plays, one of which he started by catching a Giavotella liner to end the fourth.tmpplchld In all, the Angels contributed four errors, close to the last thing the hometown squad needed with the Angels trying to claw their way into the playoffs.tmpplchld The A’s had nothing going against Angels’ starter Garrett Richards through three innings, but Reddick’s one-out single gave Oakland its first hit in the fourth. An error by Giavotella at second base and a walk loaded the bases. Richards came back to get a grounder good for a force at the plate from Brett Lawrie.tmpplchld Richards came close to working out of trouble entirely, getting two quick strikes against Eric Sogard. But the left-handed hitting second baseman whipped his bat through the strike zone on an 0-2 pitch, lined a ball that landed barely fair down the right field line and cleared the bases as Oakland took a 3-1 lead on Zito’s behalf.tmpplchld Zito, hurt by Trout’s 41st homer in the third, saw David Freese strike with a leadoff homer, his 14th, to trim the A’s advantage to 3-2, but with a man on first and one out, Zito caught Giavotella’s liner and turned it into a double play to preserve the lead.tmpplchld The sixth inning saw Mujica get two quick outs, but when Carlos Perez’s single was muffed by Sam Fuld, letting Perez get to third base, the game’s momentum changed. The score changed moments later on Giavotella’s fourth homer, a bomb to left. Before the inning was over, the A’s would go through three relievers and the Angels would add a run on a Calhoun double.tmpplchld ___tmpplchld (c)2015 The Oakland Tribune (Oakland, Calif.)tmpplchld Visit The Oakland Tribune (Oakland, Calif.) at www.insidebayarea.comtmpplchld Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.tmpplchld