by Jerry Feitelberg

The Oakland A’s have an off-day on Monday as they are travelling to the Motor City to face the Detroit Tigers for three games and then move on to Boston for a weekend series with the Red Sox. The Tigers were here last week and took two out of three from the A’s. The Tigers scored just four runs in the two wins over Oakland and, with a little luck and better fielding, the A’s could have won all three. The two losses were by one run as the Tigers won 1-0 and 3-2 after losing the opener to the A’s 4-0.

The Tigers are returning home after being swept four straight by the Los Angeles Angels  in Anaheim the past weekend and they have fallen to third place in the AL Central. The Tigers are 3-7 in their last 10 games and are 28-24 for the season. The Tigers are led by their big first baseman, the All-Everything Miguel Cabrera. Tiger designated hitter Victor Martinez is on the DL with a sore knee and is not expected to play in the series. Cabrera and Martinez have combined to be a devastating force in the Tiger lineup but with Martinez out, the Tiger offense is not as potent as it has been in the past.

The Tigers will have Alfredo Simon(5-2, 2.67 ERA) on the mound and the A’s will counter with Kendall Graveman. Graveman won his second game of the year when the A’s were in Tampa and went 5 2/3rds inning against the Yankees Thursday night. Graveman left the game trailing 3-0 but the A’s rallied to beat New York and it was a no decision for Graveman. Wednesday’s game will feature Detroit’s Anibal Sanchez (3-6, 6.75 ERA) and the A’s will have their ace, Sonny Gray (6-2, 1.82 ERA) handling the pitching chores. The final game of the series will have Shane Greene (4-4, 5.19) going against Jesse Hahn (2-5,3.77). Hahn pitched a complete game against the Tigers on May 25th beating them 4-0. Greene took the loss.

The Tigers will be looking to regroup and get on the winning track while the A’s have shown improvement as they have won six out of the last ten games played. The A’s took three out of four from the Yankees and played very well. The A’s showed improvement in several areas. They stopped making errors. They still lead the Majors with 51 so far but they hired former Ranger manager Ron Washington to work with the infielders and, hopefully, the fielding will continue to improve. The bullpen showed signs of improvement, too. The A’s were hoping that Sean Doolittle would come back and resume his closer role once he increased the velocity on his pitches. Unfortunately, Doolittle made just one appearance. Doolittle pitched one inning  and only one of pitches reached the 90 miles per hour mark. Dooliotte’s best pitch is a 93 or 94 mile per hour special. Doolittle, however, experienced severe pain in the shoulder and it was back to the DL. No one knows how long he will be sidelined. Tyler Clippard has stepped in as closer and has seven saves so far for Oakland. Evan Scribner has done a good job, too. If the A’s are going to get better, they will need Abad, Dan Otero, Arnold Leon, Fernando Rodriguez, and Angel Castro to be able to come in and do the job.

The other area of improvement has been the return of timely, or if you will clutch, hitting. The A’s went through a stretch where they went 0-for 21 with runners in scoring position. They did better in that department over the weekend against New York. The A’s kick-starter, Coco Crisp, has been on the DL for almost the whole season. The A’s tried Craig Gentry and Sam Fuld, but neither player has done  much hitting for the club. One bright spot has been the speedster, Billy Burns. Burns had had four multi-hit games and has sparked the A’s offense. Burns is hitting .327 and in Sunday’s game against New York, stole two bases and scored on Stephen Vogt’s home run.Josh Reddick is hitting.302 with 7 homers and 31 RBI while catcher Stephen Vogt’s average is .322 with 11 Home runs and 38 RBIs. Another key factor for the A’s has been the return of Ben Zobrist. Zobrist can play multiple positions and that gives Bob Melvin a lot of flexibility when he making out the lineup cards.

After the Detroit series, the A’ play the Red Sox in Boston. The Sox won two out of the three games when they were here in Oakland. The Red Sox’ offense has not been there for them this year. Their big star, David Ortiz, is not having a good year. Hanley Ramirez was hot for a while in April, but he was injured and has not regained his hitting stroke and is a defensive liability in left field. Pablo Sandoval is hitting .249 and Mike Napoli is at .208. Mookie Betts and Rusny Castillo are still question marks in the outfield. Boston’s starting pitching has been mediocre, to say the least. The starting rotation of Buchholz, Miley, Porcello and Kelley will not strike fear into any opposing team. The A’s have a chance to sneak up on Detroit and Boston before they return home to face the Texas Rangers in Oakland and then fly to Anaheim to play the Angels before heading to San Diego for two with the Padres and return home for two more with San Diego and face the Angels again for three.