The Oakland A's and Baltimore Orioles hooked up for the first time this season on Friday night and proceeded to present a number of head-scratching moments during their wild and dramatic extra-inning ballgame. The A's eventually triumphed 4-3 in 11 innings, but not before the benches cleared after Manny Machado objected to a somewhat aggressive tag by A's third baseman Josh Donaldson, and not before Nelson Cruz attempted to win the game with a straight steal of home in the tenth inning.
The latter is not a typo. The not-so-fleet-footed Cruz was 90 feet from home plate representing the game-winning run with Chris Davis, last year's home run (53) and RBI (138) leader in MLB, at the plate, and on his own accord elected to make a break for the plate to literally steal Baltimore a victory.
Did Nelson Cruz just try to steal home with Chris Davis hitting?
— Athletics Nation (@athleticsnation) June 7, 2014
Nelson Cruz trying to steal home in an extra-inning game is my new favorite thing.
— Mike Oz (@mikeoz) June 7, 2014
Needless to say, it didn't work. A's pitcher Fernando Abad calmly stepped off the mound and threw to catcher Derek Norris, who applied the easy tag and jogged back to the dugout for the 11th.
stick to home runs, Nelson Cruz
— Lana Berry (@Lana) June 7, 2014
Good advice, but hey, it seemed like a good idea at the time.
From the Baltimore Sun:*
“I thought I had a shot. Obviously, I wanted to let Davis hit with two strikes. [But] I thought I had a shot, so I went for it,” Cruz said. “The attempt was there. The third baseman was way over there. I just wanted to be aggressive and get something going.”
Showalter said it wasn't a planned play, just something Cruz thought he had.
“Saw it, felt it, went for it, didn't work out,” Showalter said.
Unfortunately, that decision really only added to an immensely frustrating half inning for Baltimore. It was one giant giveaway after another that led to the demise of a once promising rally.
Orioles outs in the bottom of the 10th: 1. sac bunt with Machado 2. Markakis out at home on single 3. Cruz out stealing home, Davis batting
— Jeff Sullivan (@based_ball) June 7, 2014
Way to make them earn it!
Oakland rallied to win the game in the 11th after J.J. Hardy committed his fourth error in two games, so it actually did get worse. Stephen Vogt collected the game-winning RBI on a single to left. *
Your browser does not support iframes.
As for the heated exchange between the team's third basemen: *

''I just tried to tag the guy. I was walking over there to go pick his helmet up for him, then he jumps up and starts yelling at me,'' Donaldson said. ''I don't know what happened on his end, but I'm just trying to do my job and play the game of baseball.''
Machado said: ''Right play, he made the right play, but I just didn't agree on the tag that he made on me and I just had to get up and confront him. You get in the heat of the moment and things start flying.''
Honestly, it looked like a pretty harmless tag, but it did cause Machado to lose his balance. After tumbling to the ground, he immediately slammed his helmet in Donaldson's direction. Perhaps it was fueled more by embarrassment than anything, but it was more than just heat of the moment. When Donaldson came to bat his next time, Wei-Yin Chen buzzed him once and then hit him on the arm.
Donaldson was fired up about it, but took his base without incident. *Nothing more came of it on Friday, but perhaps we'll see more over the weekend. Either way, it will be awfully difficult for both teams to top this game, both in drama and in hilarity. *
*
More MLB coverage from Yahoo Sports:
- - - - - - -
Mark Townsend is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Townie813