by Charlie O Mallanee

photo of Barry Zito and Tim Hudson by CBS.com

OAKLAND–It will be a moment that everybody is anticipating on the meeting between two old teammates one who pitches for the San Francisco Giants (Tim Hudson) and the other Oakland A’s starter (Barry Zito). On Sunday there is a scheduled pre game ceremony at the Oakland Coliseum that is going to be an tribute to Zito, Hudson and former Athletic Mark Mulder. Hudson and Zito will be facing each other on Saturday.

A’s assistant general manager Grady Fuson was an A’s scout director when Hudson, Mulder, and Zito were selected and brought up through the minor league system will be doing the presentation. All of the Big Three will be throwing out the first ball before Sunday’s game at the Coliseum. “The fans deserve something like that, some closure from those early years and all that fun we had you know?” Zito said on Tuesday before the game with Texas.

The reality is this is it for Barry and the reality is this is probably it for Hudson and Mulder has already hung it up his last team being the St. Louis Cardinals. It’s one of those situations where at this point it’s more tribute than probably less important then recognizing what they’ve done.

Let’s face reality even though the Giants are technically still into it they’re not going anywhere, the A’s have been eliminated they have the terrible E besides their team now because they’ve been eliminated from playoff contention. It’s meaningful and a match up between Hudson and Zito it doesn’t get that much better than that.

The A’s had to do something to make it worth the fans time to come out and for long time A’s fans and for Giants fans who appreciated what Hudson and Zito before him had done who was a Giant for seven years it would be a fitting way to pay tribute and send those guys off into retirement with a good feeling about their fans.

Final Charlie O notes: Dick Callahan the A’s PA Announcer gets the lucky draw of the schedule as this final meeting between the two clubs in September will be at the Coliseum. This was not expected to turn out to be a tribute to the Big Three when the schedule first came out but what a fine way to finish up at the Coliseum. Renal Brookes Moon the Giants PA Announcer would have like to have called the Big Three series had it been at AT&T Park but with the Giants coming to Oakland were sure she and Callahan will share PA notes.

Charlie O does the Oakland A’s podcast for http://www.sportsradioservice.com