By CHRIS BRANAM
Valley Press Staff Writer
MODESTO - The Lancaster JetHawks made one late charge, but ended up having their chance to clinch a playoff spot put on hold.
The Modesto A's took a big lead and withstood a grand slam by Jason Regan to beat the JetHawks 9-4 Wednesday night in front of a sparse crowd at John Thurman Field.
The loss sliced a game off the JetHawks (73-63 overall) lead over the A's (71-65) in the wild-card playoff chase. Lancaster's magic number stayed at two with four games left to play.
"It looked like we played a team that was really relaxed," JetHawks manager Rick Burleson said.
Regan changed the game's complexion with one swing of the bat.
With two outs in the eighth and the bases loaded, Regan ripped a pitch from A's reliever Flint Wallace over the left-field fence for a grand slam.
Despite Regan's heroics, the A's stayed in the playoff hunt thanks to the performance of 19-year-old right-hander Julian Leyva.
Leyva, Oakland's fifth-round pick in last year's draft, had arguably his best start of the season.
He held the JetHawks to just three hits - a first-inning single by Cirilo Cruz, a fifth-inning single by Jim Horner and a seventhinning single by Tarik Brock - before leaving with two outs in the top of the eighth inning.
"(Leyva) dominated," Burleson said. "He overmatched our bats."
Leyva (4-8) struck out six and only walked two. He entered the game with a 5.27 ERA, and he had given up more hits (138) than innings pitched (126 1/3).
Leyva out-dueled Joe Mays, who was let down by several defensive lapses and ended up being charged with six runs in 6 1/3 innings.
Mays, who has won just once in his last five starts, gave up seven hits and walked two in dropping to 6-4. The A's didn't manage very many good swings against the right-hander, though.
Modesto took a 2-0 lead in the third on Jose Ortiz's bloop single and a sacrifice fly by Scott Brosius, the Oakland third baseman who was on a single-game rehabilitation assignment.
Cody McKay led off the fifth with a single that was played into a triple by left fielder Yuni Kim, who lazily tried to field the ball - only to have it skip by him and roll to the wall.
"If you don't play good defense, then you're not going to win those games," Burleson said.
McKay scored one batter later when Jose Soriano hit a deep drive to center field that was turned into a sacrifice fly when Joe Mathis made a diving catch.
The A's scored four times in the seventh. Most of the scoring came on Ortiz's 16th homer, a three-run shot off reliever Aaron Scheffer that cleared the left-field wall.
After Regan's grand slam tightened up the game, the A's added two runs against Kevin Gryboski in the bottom of the eighth. McKay had an RBI double and Soriano picked up an RBI single.