McCann goes deep off ... McCann? How this wild moment came to be

OAKLAND -- It was McCann vs. McCann: the A's Kyle McCann and the Orioles' James McCann. Both are catchers, and in a bizarre twist, one McCann took the other deep -- but probably not the one most would expect.

James was on the mound in the eighth inning of Oakland's 19-8 rout of Baltimore on Saturday at the Coliseum, a game that the A's offense controlled from beginning to end. Kyle, pinch-hitting for Brent Rooker, crushed a two-run blast to close the scoring for the A's.

"It was a cool moment," Kyle McCann said. "It's actually kind of hard to hit position players, but I just tried to see a ball middle and put a good swing on it, and it happened to be a homer."

The 19-run outburst was the second most runs Oakland has scored this season, fewer than only the 20 runs it plated against Miami at the Coliseum on May 4.

How did one of the best clubs in the American League end up sending a position player to the mound against one of the worst? It took a top-to-bottom effort.

"I thought today was probably our best overall offensive game of the year, really," manager Mark Kotsay said. "The at-bats were really good. We took some walks, we didn't strike out as much. Good job with two-strike hitting and approach, and then we slugged."

Oakland bounced Baltimore rookie Cade Povich from the game early. The onslaught began with Rooker's team-leading 18th homer, a three-run shot to put up a crooked number in the first inning. Povich then faced five batters in the second without recording an out, setting up a big inning for the A's.

The seven-run second was the stunner, but Oakland consistently put pressure on Baltimore, scoring in every inning except the fifth and seventh.

Rooker, making his final push for back-to-back All-Star nods, paced his club with four RBIs and finished 3-for-4. Five other Oakland players recorded multiple hits: Miguel Andujar (3-for-4, double, three RBIs), Shea Langeliers (2-for-5, homer, three RBIs), Tyler Nevin (3-for-5, triple shy of the cycle), Brett Harris (3-for-4, two doubles) and Max Schuemann (2-for-5, homer, three RBIs).

All but two A's players in the starting lineup recorded at least one hit, and those who didn't -- Daz Cameron and Armando Alvarez -- still factored into the run production. Cameron walked and scored three times, and Alvarez reached on a fielder's choice and crossed the plate for the A's seventh and final run of the second inning.

Perhaps most impressively, Oakland had as many walks as strikeouts, six apiece. The A's 874 strikeouts are the second most in the Majors, behind only the Mariners' 936.

On the bump, starter Luis Medina navigated traffic on the bases to complete five innings of one-run ball. He faced trouble in the top of the third, when the Orioles loaded the bases on two singles and a walk with nobody out, but he pulled off an escape act to get out of the frame cleanly.

"Good thing that Shea and I got on the same plan together," Medina said through interpreter Ramon Hernandez. "I was executing the pitches to get out of that inning, especially with a team like that."

The A's can look to the Orioles as a blueprint for how to go from a rebuild to contention, even though the contrast between the two teams is stark at present.

Baltimore is fighting for a division title and a repeat trip to the postseason. Oakland is trying to take a step forward from consecutive 100-plus-loss seasons.

But the A's have played the Orioles well this year, taking two of three in Baltimore in April and evening the three-game set in Oakland -- and of course, hitting O's pitching so hard that the rare McCann vs. McCann matchup came to be.

Kyle McCann didn't have much to work with. The pitch he hit out of the park was a 45.3 mph eephus, and he was able to muscle it a Statcast-projected 406 feet at 100.6 mph off the bat.

"He's lucky he didn't get [James] McCann's knuckleball," Kotsay said.

It was McCann's fourth home run of the season -- and his second against the Orioles. The other one came with much more at stake on April 28 in Baltimore, when he took O's closer Craig Kimbrel deep for a game-winning blast.

Of course, they all count the same in the scorebook.

"The other one was a little more dramatic," McCann said, "but I'll take the one today as well."