'How Is This Happening?'

We spent two weeks with Oakland’s latest band of fun-loving misfits to discover how the A’s are once again defying the odds and streaking toward October.

- Tim Keown

By the time he neared second base, Oakland shortstop Marcus Semien sensed something was off. The vibe in Minute Maid Park was weirdly uncomfortable. It’s not like he expected an ovation in Houston, but this was like jogging through a crypt. What happened? Did everyone disappear? He was feeling pretty good about the home run he’d just hit off Gerrit Cole, but the silence that followed was unlike anything he could remember. It was enough to make a guy feel self-conscious.

Semien’s homer came in the second inning of the first game of a three-game series in the last week of August. The A’s had already crafted a nice little season for themselves, and they’d long ago detected a whiff of disbelief from the outside world. Usually that doubt was voiced: questions that presumed the A’s were as surprised by their success as everyone else; suggestions that even a 70-game hot streak could be a ruse; expert analysis that warned against the folly of trusting a team with almost no starting pitching. The disbelief, however, had never been this quiet. The Astros came into the game with five straight wins. One of their star pitchers was on the mound. The A’s were a day removed from disabling one starting pitcher, Sean Manaea, and a day away from disabling another, Brett Anderson. The crowd at Minute Maid Park, where cargo shorts and tall beers are always the order of the day, was ready for its champions to send a message: Nice story you got there, A’s. Too bad it’s over.

And then Cole threw, and Semien connected, and the world seemed to stop as he rounded the bases. The Astros won the game, but that doesn’t diminish the moment. Oakland’s entire season was embedded in that silence. It was the silence of the muted skeptic, an I-can’t-even silence that carried a message that hit like a sleeper wave:

These guys—whoever the hell they are—aren’t going away.