by Michael Duca

OAKLAND–In the San Francisco-Los Angeles series there was a laugher on both sides with the Giants taking the first game on Friday night 9-0 and L.A. with their laugher 17-0 on Saturday. The first game was everything that the Giants could have asked for as the team that leads baseball in runs scored, they lead baseball in batting average and with runners in scoring position since the All-Star break.

The Giants also went out and extended their home winning streak to ten games, all was right with the world it was happy everything looked glorious, they were getting ready to come back on Saturday and watch the Giants catch the Dodgers instead the Giants apparently caught Ebola getting blasted 17-0.

In the case of the win-loss laughers for the Giants like I told my wife “some days your the mosquito and some day your the windshield” and the Giants were the windshield on Friday and showed up as a mosquito on Saturday. That was just as bad as you could lose a game the good news is, 1-0, 17-0, it all counts as a loss and you just move onto the next day.

The next day was a pretty good game a 4-2 , no blow out here and Giant pitcher Yusmeiro Petit is the fifth starter in the rotation and has the major league record in consecutive innings pitched without a run by a pitcher. Regarding the 17-0 whipping the Giants got on Saturday it illustrates a lot of things about baseball, the Dodgers lost the night before 9-0 and it didn’t seem to put them in a terrible funk and the Dodgers came out and racked up 17 runs.

The Giants have now lost three straight and have two more left with Arizona and are tied with the Pittsburgh Pirates for first in the N.L. wild card.

Oakland A’s update: Until last Saturday it was looking pretty grim for the Oakland A’s since they won back to back games and it’s been almost 40 games since Brandon Moss hit a home run. Look how rapidly things changed they always do well against Mariners pitcher Felix Hernandez they usually lose against him they did well against Hernandez. Saturday the A’s did well and they won 3-2 and you could imagine what kind of effect that had in the A’s clubhouse.

They came out and pitched well on Sunday and wound up taking that series as they got the rubber game shutting out the M’s 4-0. The back to back wins solidified themselves in the wild card as the A’s are with the Kansas City Royals. If the A’s lose that series there’s a good chance the A’s don’t make the playoffs.

It was looking that ugly and until Sunday the A’s won back to back games and they hadn’t done that in more than three weeks. You can’t limp along to the finish line win one, lose one, win one, lose two, that’s not going to get you there. The M’s have been closing ground rapidly on the A’s. Their in a situation where either Detroit or Kansas City is going to be one of the wild cards and if the A’s are going to be one of the other wild cards they have to hold off the Mariners.

It’s been Josh Donaldson and the seven dwarfs for the last few weeks and the role of Snow White doesn’t fit him that well. The A’s are in need of some help in that line up so getting contribution from Moss and Adam Dunn certainly don’t hurt but the truth is as Coco (Crisp) goes so goes the A’s.

Michael Duca does A’s and Giants commentary each week for http://www.sportsradioservice.com