OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — The ball from the final out safely in Kevin Pillar's glove, teammate Jo Adell reminded the veteran center fielder he might just want to keep this one.
Perhaps it would be a meaningful souvenir from the Los Angeles Angels' last scheduled visit to Oakland. And Pillar immediately realized it had to go to manager Ron Washington, the longtime Athletics' third base and infield coach who still feels so fondly about the franchise and city.
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OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — The ball from the final out safely in Kevin Pillar's glove, teammate Jo Adell reminded the veteran center fielder he might just want to keep this one.
Los Angeles Angels shortstop Zach Neto (9) celebrates with center fielder Kevin Pillar, center, and first baseman Brandon Drury (23) after they defeated the Oakland Athletics in a baseball game in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Los Angeles Angels' Kevin Pillar connects for a two-run double against the Oakland Athletics during the eighth inning of a baseball game in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group via AP)
Los Angeles Angels manager Ron Washington walks to the dugout after making a pitching change during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Oakland Athletics in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Los Angeles Angels' Jo Adell (7) is congratulated by manager Ron Washington, second from left, and teammates after scoring during the eighth inning of a baseball game against the Oakland Athletics in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Los Angeles Angels manager Ron Washington gestures toward players during the seventh inning of a baseball game against the Oakland Athletics in Oakland, Calif., Saturday, July 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Washington's Angels rallied to beat the A's 8-5 on Sunday at the Coliseum, where Oakland is playing its final season before at least three years scheduled for Sacramento ahead of a planned move to Las Vegas for the 2028 season.
“It was the last opportunity to do something good in this ballpark in my favor and my team pulled it out and got the win,” Washington said. “And when he gave me that ball it was a great surprise and joy. I wrote on it, ‘last out of my last game managing in the Coliseum.' It was heartfelt.”
The Angels won their 5,000th game as a franchise, too, in the very venue where they clinched the 2004 and ’05 AL West crowns.
Washington used to show up early as an A's coach and toss short-hop grounders from his knees to help groom some of the games great infielders before they were great.
“I feel a huge bond because this is where it all started,” the 72-year-old Washington said.
From Jason Giambi, Miguel Tejada, Eric Chavez and Mark Ellis to Marcus Semien, Washington helped many of them to shine and become who they were on the diamond — and even off it as Washington noted, “Mark McGwire, I turned him into a great leader.”
Chavez gifted Washington one of his six straight Gold Glove awards earned from 2001-06.
“I watched many young kids come through here and grow, I watched many baseball players that the industry thought were through come through here and blossom and get deeper contracts for their careers,” Washington said. “... The tradition here in Oakland, I just saw it kept passing down and kept passing down. I've had a great 17 years here.”
So you bet everyone around the Angels realized what it meant to Washington to leave with such a fond memory on Sunday. He caught up with the A's grounds crew he was so close with over the years, too.
“He's probably not going to show it very much but that one definitely meant a lot to him,” starting pitcher Carson Fulmer said.
Pillar hit a two-run double in the decisive eight inning as the Angels snapped an eight-game losing streak on Oakland's home field.
“In the moment you maybe don't maybe understand the magnitude of the moment but when I caught the last out Jo was like, ‘That’s a good ball to keep' and I'm thinking, because I drove in some runs earlier? I was thinking maybe as a memory for myself then I was like, ‘Oh, it’s the last time we're here.'
"Normally in those situations you give the ball to the closer, he earns the ball last out. As I was going through the line I was like you know what, maybe I give this ball to Wash. He was a big part of the fabric of this place and Oakland baseball. For him to leave with that game ball and to win his last game coaching here it will probably mean a lot to him.”
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Los Angeles Angels' Anthony Rendon scores on two-run double by teammate Kevin Pillar during the eighth inning of a baseball game against the Oakland Athletics in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group via AP)
Los Angeles Angels shortstop Zach Neto (9) celebrates with center fielder Kevin Pillar, center, and first baseman Brandon Drury (23) after they defeated the Oakland Athletics in a baseball game in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Los Angeles Angels' Kevin Pillar connects for a two-run double against the Oakland Athletics during the eighth inning of a baseball game in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group via AP)
Los Angeles Angels manager Ron Washington walks to the dugout after making a pitching change during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Oakland Athletics in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Los Angeles Angels' Jo Adell (7) is congratulated by manager Ron Washington, second from left, and teammates after scoring during the eighth inning of a baseball game against the Oakland Athletics in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Los Angeles Angels manager Ron Washington gestures toward players during the seventh inning of a baseball game against the Oakland Athletics in Oakland, Calif., Saturday, July 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Boeing’s first astronaut mission ended Friday night with an empty capsule landing and two test pilots still in space, left behind until next year because NASA judged their return too risky.
Six hours after departing the International Space Station, Starliner parachuted into New Mexico’s White Sands Missile Range, descending on autopilot through the desert darkness.
It was an uneventful close to a drama that began with the June launch of Boeing's long-delayed crew debut and quickly escalated into a dragged-out cliffhanger of a mission stricken by thruster failures and helium leaks. For months, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams’ return was in question as engineers struggled to understand the capsule’s problems.
Boeing insisted after extensive testing that Starliner was safe to bring the two home, but NASA disagreed and booked a flight with SpaceX instead. Their SpaceX ride won’t launch until the end of this month, which means they’ll be up there until February — more than eight months after blasting off on what should have been a quick trip.
Wilmore and Williams should have flown Starliner back to Earth by mid-June, a week after launching in it. But their ride to the space station was marred by the cascade of thruster trouble and helium loss, and NASA ultimately decided it was too risky to return them on Starliner.
So with fresh software updates, the fully automated capsule left with their empty seats and blue spacesuits along with some old station equipment.
“She’s on her way home,” Williams radioed as the white and blue-trimmed capsule undocked from the space station 260 miles (420 kilometers) over China and disappeared into the black void.
Williams stayed up late to see how everything turned out. “A good landing, pretty awesome,” said Boeing's Mission Control.
Cameras on the space station and a pair of NASA planes caught the capsule as a white streak coming in for the touchdown, which drew cheer.
There were some snags during reentry, including more thruster issues, but Starliner made a “bull’s-eye landing,” said NASA’s commercial crew program manager Steve Stich.
Even with the safe return, “I think we made the right decision not to have Butch and Suni on board,” Stich said at a news conference early Saturday. “All of us feel happy about the successful landing. But then there's a piece of us, all of us, that we wish it would have been the way we had planned it.”
Boeing did not participate in the Houston news briefing. But two of the company's top space and defense officials, Ted Colbert and Kay Sears, told employees in a note that they backed NASA's ruling.
"While this may not have been how we originally envisioned the test flight concluding, we support NASA’s decision for Starliner and are proud of how our team and spacecraft performed," the executives wrote.
Starliner’s crew demo capped a journey filled with delays and setbacks. After the space shuttles retired more than a decade ago, NASA hired Boeing and SpaceX for orbital taxi service. Boeing ran into so many problems on its first test flight with no one aboard in 2019 that it had to repeat it. The 2022 do-over uncovered even more flaws and the repair bill topped $1 billion.
SpaceX’s crew ferry flight later this month will be its 10th for NASA since 2020. The Dragon capsule will launch on the half-year expedition with only two astronauts since two seats are reserved for Wilmore and Williams for the return leg.
As veteran astronauts and retired Navy captains, Wilmore and Williams anticipated hurdles on the test flight. They’ve kept busy in space, helping with repairs and experiments. The two are now full-time station crew members along with the seven others on board.
Even before the pair launched on June 5 from Cape Canaveral, Florida, Starliner’s propulsion system was leaking helium. The leak was small and thought to be isolated, but four more cropped up after liftoff. Then five thrusters failed. Although four of the thrusters were recovered, it gave NASA pause as to whether more malfunctions might hamper the capsule’s descent from orbit.
Boeing conducted numerous thruster tests in space and on the ground over the summer, and was convinced its spacecraft could safely bring the astronauts back. But NASA could not get comfortable with the thruster situation and went with SpaceX.
Flight controllers conducted more test firings of the capsule’s thrusters following undocking; one failed to ignite. Engineers suspect the more the thrusters are fired, the hotter they become, causing protective seals to swell and obstruct the flow of propellant. They won’t be able to examine any of the parts; the section holding the thrusters was ditched just before reentry.
Starliner will be transported in a couple weeks back to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, where the analyses will unfold.
NASA officials stressed that the space agency remains committed to having two competing U.S. companies transporting astronauts. The goal is for SpaceX and Boeing to take turns launching crews — one a year per company — until the space station is abandoned in 2030 right before its fiery reentry. That doesn’t give Boeing much time to catch up, but the company intends to push forward with Starliner, according to NASA.
Stich said post-landing it’s too early to know when the next Starliner flight with astronauts might occur.
“It will take a little time to determine the path forward," he said.
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NASA astronauts Mike Fincke, left, and Scott Tingle look inside NASA's Boeing Crew Flight Test Starliner spacecraft after the empty capsule landed at White Sands Missile Range's Space Harbor, Friday, Sept. 6, 2024, in New Mexico. (Aubrey Gemignani/NASA via AP)
In this photo provided by NASA, Boeing and NASA teams work around NASA's Boeing Crew Flight Test Starliner spacecraft after it landed uncrewed, Friday, Sept. 6, 2024, at White Sands, New Mexico, after undocking from the International Space Station. (Aubrey Gemignani/NASA via AP)
In this photo provided by NASA, Boeing and NASA teams work around NASA's Boeing Crew Flight Test Starliner spacecraft after it landed uncrewed, Friday, Sept. 6, 2024, at White Sands, New Mexico, after undocking from the International Space Station. (Aubrey Gemignani/NASA via AP)
The empty Boeing Starliner capsule sits at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, late Friday, Sept. 6, 2024, after undocking from the International Space Station. (Boeing via AP)
In this image from video provided by NASA, the empty Boeing Starliner capsule jettisons its heat shield, bottom, before touching down at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico late Friday, Sept. 6, 2024, after undocking from the International Space Station. (NASA via AP)
In this image from video provided by NASA, the empty Boeing Starliner capsule floats down towards White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico late Friday, Sept. 6, 2024, after undocking from the International Space Station. (NASA via AP)
In this image from video provided by NASA, the empty Boeing Starliner capsule touches down at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico late Friday, Sept. 6, 2024, after undocking from the International Space Station. (NASA via AP)
In this image from video provided by NASA, the unmanned Boeing Starliner capsule undocks as it pulls away from the International Space Station on Friday, Sept. 6, 2024. (NASA via AP)
In this image from video provided by NASA, the unmanned Boeing Starliner capsule fires its thrusters as it pulls away from the International Space Station on Friday, Sept. 6, 2024. (NASA via AP)
In this photo provided by NASA, astronauts Butch Wilmore, left, and Suni Williams inspect safety hardware aboard the International Space Station on Aug. 9, 2024. (NASA via AP)
