SEATTLE - Dana Eveland got his third win of the season and the Oakland Athletics got just three hits but took advantage of wild Seattle starter Miguel Batista to beat the Mariners 4-3 Friday night.

The A's (15-9), supposedly destined for the bottom of the AL West in a rebuilding season, clinched their first winning record in April since 2003. That team won 96 games and the division.

AP

Oakland Athletics catcher makes a diving catch of a pop bunt for an out hit by Seattle Mariners' Ichiro Suzuki during the fifth inning.

Eveland (3-1) allowed six hits and three runs in 5 1-3 innings. He struck out three and walked one. The bullpen then worked out of several jams.

Ichiro Suzuki led off the ninth by walking against Huston Street. Mariners manager John McLaren then asked Jose Lopez, who had four hits, to bunt instead of having Suzuki attempt to steal second. Lopez fouled out trying for the sacrifice. Raul Ibanez then flied out, and shortstop Bobby Crosby finished the game with a diving stop of Adrian Beltre's ground ball.

Street got his eighth save in nine chances.

With the bases loaded in the eighth, Andrew Brown got Yuniesky Betancourt to ground into an inning-ending double play that first baseman Daric Barton nimbly completed with a nice stretch. Betancourt slammed his helmet into the ground in frustration.

Lopez's fourth hit and another single by Ibanez put another tying run at second in the seventh. But 38-year-old Alan Embree retired Beltre on a fly ball to end that threat.

Batista (2-3) became the fourth Mariners pitcher this month to get hurt. The 37-year-old right-hander allowed three runs and labored through 42 pitches in the first.

Frank Thomas, in the second game of his return to Oakland, broke an 0-for-16 slump with a single that scored Kurt Suzuki with the first run. Then Batista walked Emil Brown to make it 2-0. With the bases still loaded, Batista allowed Thomas to score when he threw a wild pitch near Crosby's chin and to the backstop on a fly.

The inning was so rough that the large home crowd on Ichiro Suzuki Bobblehead Night booed many of his pitches and cheered mockingly when he managed an occasional strike.

After Batista walked Kurt Suzuki leading off the second, McLaren walked to the mound with a trainer and quickly summoned Cha Seung Baek from the bullpen. The Mariners soon announced their leader in wins (16) last season had a mild right groin strain. Batista will be reevaluated Saturday.

After Seattle got within 3-1 in the bottom of the first on Ibanez's sacrifice fly that scored Suzuki, the A's made it 4-1 in the second. Brown doubled, went to third on a fly out and scored on a sacrifice fly by Ryan Sweeney.

Baek, mostly mothballed so far this season, retired his final 15 batters after Brown's double. He allowed one hit and one run in six innings.