Bleday homers, Estes earns first win as A's beat Mariners 8

SEATTLE (AP) — Rookie starter Joey Estes struck out five in five solid innings after being called up earlier in the day for his first major league win, and the Oakland Athletics beat the Seattle Mariners 8-1 on Saturday night.

Abraham Toro and Brent Rooker hit run-scoring singles in the two-run third inning to put Oakland up 2-1. Max Schuemann added a three-run double in the eighth and JJ Bleday had a two-run homer in the ninth as Oakland snapped a two-game losing streak. The A’s had lost five of six following a six-game winning streak.

Estes took a liner off his right bicep from Julio Rodríguez in the first inning, but gathered the ball for the throw to first and waved off the trainer as he retook the mound.

“You knew he was locked in when Julio’s line drive went off his biceps and I didn’t realize it,” A’s manager Mark Kotsay said. “That kid, I don’t know how to describe him really. You take a line drive like that off the biceps, and don’t have the trainers come out, don’t want it recognized. He came in the dugout and we finally got to him and it was already swollen.”

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