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Rodriguez’s big fifth inning sets up later A’s heroics; Reddick glad to have gotten first homer out of the way

The way baseball is, the way the media is and the way fans are, most of what will be written about and talked about the Oakland bullpen this year will fall on Sean Doolittle and Ryan Madson.

And for legitimate reasons – they pitch the final two innings, and the final two innings is often where a game is won or lost.

On Friday, the game was decided, to a large degree, anyway, in the fifth inning. Manager Bob Melvin went to the pen for Fernando Rodriguez with one out and men on first and third after the second of two Jed Lowrie errors had put starter Eric Surkamp in a bind.