Rookies Play Key Roles for Athletics

Two rookies kept the Oakland Athletics steamrolling toward first place.

Dan Johnson’s heads-up baserunning made sure his homecoming was a happy one and Joe Blanton gave up two hits in seven innings in a 2-1 victory over the Minnesota Twins on Monday night at Minneapolis.

Blanton (6-9) struck out four and walked two to get the first road victory of his career and Johnson scored the go-ahead run in the seventh to extend Oakland’s winning streak to five games. The A’s moved within a game of the Angels in the American League West.

“This is one of my top moments in baseball,” said Johnson, a native of Coon Rapids, Minn., who had more than 150 family and friends on hand for his first major league game in the Metrodome. “It was above the College World Series.”

After driving a ball to right-center field in the seventh inning, Johnson saw center fielder Lew Ford had to play it on his glove side. Ford’s soft toss on the run allowed Johnson to race into second base, and he scored two batters later on a single by Scott Hatteberg to give the A’s a 2-1 lead.

Blanton was 0-6 with a 5.18 earned-run average in nine previous road starts, but he feasted on the Twins, who have scored only 64 runs since the All-Star break, the second-fewest in the American League.

Johan Santana (10-6) gave up two runs and five hits and struck out seven in seven innings.

*

Chicago 6, Baltimore 3 -- Mark Buehrle’s streak of pitching at least six innings ended at 49 games with an ejection for hitting a batter with a pitch, but the White Sox still went on to complete their first four-game sweep at Baltimore since 1954.

Buehrle (12-4) had pitched six innings or more in every start since May 5, 2004. He was well on his way to extending the streak until he hit B.J. Surhoff in the back with a pitch with two out in the sixth and was ejected by plate umpire Brian Gorman.

After Oriole starter Daniel Cabrera hit A.J. Pierzynski with a pitch in the top of the sixth, no warning was issued. But in the bottom half, Gorman wasted no time tossing Buehrle.