WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Seiya Suzuki homered twice and drove in five runs as the Chicago Cubs beat the Athletics 10-2 on Wednesday to complete a three-game sweep.
Matt Shaw added two RBI singles for the Cubs, who outscored the A’s 35-9 in the first major league series played at Sutter Health Park, the club’s planned home for the next three years before a proposed relocation to Las Vegas.
Suzuki hit an early three-run homer for the second consecutive game when he connected in the second inning off Jeffrey Springs (1-1). Suzuki went deep again leading off the fourth before adding a late RBI single.
It was Suzuki’s fourth career multi-homer game. He has at least two hits in each of his last four games, with four home runs and 11 RBIs during that span.
Jacob Wilson had three of the A’s five hits and Brent Rooker hit a two-run homer against Jameson Taillon (1-1) as the hosts lost their fourth straight game. Taillon struck out seven over six innings.
The 35 runs scored by Chicago marked the most the A’s have allowed in their first three home games of a season, topping the 31 they yielded in 1922. The previous team to give up 35 runs over its first three home games was the 2009 New York Yankees, who permitted 37 and then went on to win the World Series. The 1951 St. Louis Browns allowed 42 runs in their first three at home.
The series finale drew a crowd of 9,342. Total announced attendance for the initial three-game set at Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento was 31,556 after the opener Monday had a sellout of 12,119.
Rooker’s two-run homer in the third was all the offense the A’s could muster.
Chicago has five straight multi-homer games and the club’s 13 home runs during that stretch are most in the National League.
Both teams are off Thursday, with the Cubs finally heading home to host San Diego on Friday after starting the season in Japan and then going to Arizona and Sacramento. RHP Osvaldo Bido (1-0, 1.80 ERA) pitches for the A’s at Colorado on Friday.
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