by Jerry Feitelberg

Time for the A’s to Make Hay

The A’s beat the lowly but pesky Houston Astros on Thurs and they upped their major league best record to 63-38. After the game the A’s embark on a six game road trip to Texas where they will face the Texas Rangers and the Houston Astros again. The Rangers, if you can believe it, have a worse record than the Astros. The Rangers’ pitching staff has been decimated by injury and the team is just not very good right now. There is some speculation that Ranger Manager Ron Washington will be fired after the season. The Rangers’ top acquisition in the off season was Prince Fielder. The big lefty slugger is out for the season and the Ranger offense has been weakened.

The A’s will send Jason Hammel to pitch Friday night. Hammel is looking for his first win as an A since coming to Oakland in a trade with the Cubs. Sonny Gray (11-3, 2.72) will pitch game two and Scott Kazmir(11-3, 2.32) will go in the finale. The Rangers are sending out three pitchers with losing record. Jerome Williams(1-4, ERA over 6) will pitch Friday night. Nick Tepesch(1-2,4.75) goes on Saturday and Miles Mikolas (1-6,7.48) on Sunday. The A’s then travel to Houston to face a team that played them tough in the three game series that concluded on Thursday but the A’s took two out of three and clobbered them 13-1 in the finale. After that, the A’s come home to face the Kansas City Royals for three, the Tampa Bay Rays for three and four with the Minnesota Twins. The only team without a losing record is the Royals but they are at the .500 mark with a record of 50-50. The Rays are four games under .500 but have as of July 24th won seven in a row. The Rays had a lot of injuries earlier in the season but are playing well as those players are now healthy. The Twins are in last place in the AL Central with a 46-54 record.

The Angels, who are now 2 ½ games behind the A’s, start a four game series against the Detroit Tigers

Thursday and will have to face Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander and Rick Porcello. The Angels then o on a tough road trip as they travel to Baltimore to play the Orioles again. The Orioles took two out of three in Anaheim and are in first place in the AL East. The Angels then go to Tampa Bay to face the Rays and as noted above, the Rays are playing well and could be a problem for the Angels. The Angels road doesn’t get any easier as they return “home” to play a four game series with the Los Angeles Dodgers. The first two games of the series will be in Los Angeles and the last two games will be in Anaheim. The Angels then have to face the Boston Red Sox for three. The Red Sox have been playing better as of late and would love to upset the Angels apple cart.

It will be up to A’s manager, Bob Melvin, to keep his troops focused. The A’s have to feast on these team and they could put a lot of distance between them and the Angels. The Angels have the second best record in the American League and know that they can’t afford to lose any of these series as they want to keep pace with the A’s. The season is about two thirds complete. The trade deadline happens a week from today and the stretch drive to the playoffs begins. Should be a lot of fun and, hopefully,

the fans will come out and support the best team in the American League, the Oakland Athletics.