Two days after a trade that brought him back to the Brewers for cash, righty reliever Joel Kuhnel joined his new team on Monday for a wild, 15-14 win in 12 innings over his old team, the A’s. He arrived just in time to provide intel not only on the team that designated him for assignment last week, but on the Triple-A ballpark that Kuhnel called home earlier this year. The A’s are playing a regular-season homestand in Sin City while their new stadium rises on the Las Vegas Strip, and Kuhnel predicted it will probably be more popular with Brewers hitters than Brewers pitchers. “Be cautious,” he said. “The ball flies.” Boy, was he right. Andrew Vaughn ripped a game-tying two-run double in the ninth inning as part of a four-hit, four-RBI night, and William Contreras smashed the visitors’ fourth home run of the night in a four-run 10th. Still, it took Christian Yelich dashing home on a grounder in the 12th, and relievers Abner Uribe and Chad Patrick somehow putting up zeroes in each of the final two innings, for the Brewers to finish their comeback win. A’s leadoff man Shea Langeliers called it “wild,” which is the word we always use for games like this. But wild is an understatement in this case. The Brewers and A’s combined to make 16 challenges via the Automatic Ball-Strike (ABS) System, four more than any other game this season. Both teams came back from four-run deficits. They traded four-run rallies in the 10th while combining for three home runs in that inning alone, and combined to hit 11 home runs on the night. The Brewers hit four and the A’s hit seven, including two apiece for Tyler Soderstrom and Nick Kurtz. But the homer that hurt the Brewers the most was a fly ball with two outs in the 10th and Milwaukee up a run. When Jonah Heim lifted the ball in the air off Aaron Ashby, everyone wearing Brewers blue thought it was a game-ending out. Milwaukee television play-by-play man Jeff Levering started the call with, “And a popup into right…” Contreras, the catcher, clapped his glove in celebration. Ashby put his head down and got ready to shake hands. He confirmed later that he thought the game was over. He would have been the first pitcher in the Majors to reach double-digit wins, even though they’re all in relief. Trouble was, there is no such thing as a popup here. The baseball carried and carried and carried, all the way to the right field wall and over. The teams, which were tied at 10-10 going into the inning, were tied at 14-14 when it was all ov
