Happy Friday, Athletics Nation!
One prevailing narrative about the A’s is that they are looking pretty good these days. I watched Monday’s win against the Cardinals, and couldn’t help but notice how much the St. Louis broadcast crew was gushing about the A’s lineup as they racked up 11 runs—and Nick Kurtz wasn’t even in the game that day!
But the A’s offense faltered in the two games that followed, scoring just one run in each contest as the Cards came back to take the series. The A’s have now lost
five of their last six games, leaving them three games behind the Angels as they head to Anaheim for one last chance to swiftly gain ground in the race to avoid last place in the AL West.
The Angels have dominated the A’s this season, having won the first seven games between the two teams through two series sweeps in May and June. The A’s took two of three in Sacramento last month with a very robust 22 runs worth of offensive production; that still left the Angels ahead 8-2 on the season. Hopefully this weekend’s series will play out similarly to give the A’s some respectability and a shot at fourth place in their division.
The A’s current doldrum has made it rather unlikely that the team will manage to finish the season with a .500 record: to do so would require them to win 17 of their remaining 21 games.
Mason Barnett is slated to make his second big league start for the A’s today, with J.T. Ginn and Luis Severino scheduled to pitch through the weekend. No one among this trio has notched a win since Severino did so on August 5th—though Sevy can’t be blamed for the A’s loss in his latest start on Tuesday, having thrown five scoreless without the benefit of even a single run in support of his effort.
My gut feeling is that the A’s are going to need their bats to show up in order to succeed in this series. Have a wonderful weekend, AN.
A’s Coverage:
- A’s Top Prospect From San Diego Padres Trade Has Career Night
- Former A’s First Rounder Lands with Los Angeles Angels
- Cardinals set worrying franchise history vs. Athletics
- These 5 teams could spoil someone’s September
MLB News & Interest:
- Mason Miller’s Immaculate Inning: Bigger and Weirder
- Stats of the Week: Witt joins elite company, vintage Verlander and more!
- Peralta extends ‘pretty darn special’ MLB-best scoreless streak to 29 IP
- NPB’s Kazuma Okamoto, Tatsuya Imai Hoping To Be Posted For MLB Teams
- Dodgers’ troubling trend of losing to sub-.500 teams continues
- The Face You Make When Shohei Ohtani Hits a Homer 120 Miles per Hour
- After scratch on Wednesday, Shohei set to start Monday vs. Rox
- 15 SB in 5 games!? Dodgers prospect rides historic spree to 100-steal season
- Cristian Javier Is Back, but at What Cost?
- Today in Baseball History
Best of X:
Roster moves.
Nett with a bevy of Ks.
Free tickets for food drive donations.
