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MLB: Oakland 4, Texas 2

ARLINGTON, Texas, April 30 (UPI) -- Five scoreless innings Thursday from Dallas Braden helped lead the Oakland Athletics to a 4-2 victory against the Texas Rangers.

Braden (3-2) surrendered five hits with four walks and six strikeouts in 111 pitches before he was replaced by Andrew Bailey at the start of the bottom of the sixth.

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Bailey hurled two scoreless innings, Russ Springer gave up two hits -- one a solo homer by Hank Blalock in the eighth -- while Michael Wuertz earned his first save despite serving up a solo homer by Andruw Jones in the ninth.

A key play was Ryan Sweeney's leaping catch on an eighth-inning fly by Ian Kinsler.

Matt Holliday hit a solo homer in the ninth, one of Oakland's 11 hits.

Kurt Suzuki had two hits and one RBI for the Athletics, who broke a string of five straight setbacks against losing pitcher Vicente Padilla (1-2).

He gave up three runs and eight hits in six innings.

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