Disappointing Series in MN

"Three fine starts by A's pitchers at Seattle were systematically rubbed out by three correspondingly poor performances at Minnesota." -Susan Slusser, on the A's last series

Well, that didn't turn out to be so much fun. I had suggested that the pitching matchups would favor the A's, but things certainly did not turn out the way I was hoping.

The A's get a chance to bounce back this weekend in Oakland against the Rangers.

Friday - Millwood vs. Zito
Saturday - Padilla vs. Harden
Sunday - Loe vs. Haren

Again, the matchups should favor the A's. Let's hope it plays out a little better this time around.

Twinkies Up Next

My least favorite Twin was always Brian Harper. He was never the best Twin, but he seemed to have a knack for killing the A's. From 1988-1993, it seemed like he could drop a flare double on the left- or right-field line against the A's at will, and his success drove me bonkers.

Here's his career line with the Twins: .306 BA / .342 OBP / .431 SLG
And against the A's: .351 / .404 / .490
(Thanks to Baseball Musings' amazing day-by-day database for the numbers)

Brian Harper was a quality major league catcher, but he had no business putting those numbers up against my A's. I guess the A's brought out the best in Harper, and Harper brought out the worst in me. I hated him.

No one on the Twins today makes my blood boil like Brian Hunter, but I'd like to see the A's sweep 'em all the same.

Tuesday: Haren vs. Radke
Wednesday: Loaiza vs. Silva
Thursday: Blanton vs. Lohse

The A's don't have to face Johan Santana (a now-perennial favorite for the Cy Young) and the Twins miss both Zito and Harden. So, it's really a battle of the back-end of the rotations, and I like the A's chances. Let's hope Haren, Loaiza and Blanton continue the 0.43 starters' ERA we saw over the weekend in Seattle.

Nice Start, Indeed

Bradley, Thomas making presence felt / Newcomers key A's win over Yankees

"It's a nice way to start,'' said A's third baseman Eric Chavez ... "Opening Night was probably more disheartening for the fans, but we were able to shake it off."

Chavez is right. A 2-1 series victory over the Yankees is a good way to start any season. Putting aside Monday's disastrous performance, the A's have won with good pitching, great defense, quality base-running and clutch hitting. Just as Tuesday morning was too early to write off the season, Thursday morning is too early to start printing the playoff tickets... But as an A's fan, you've gotta feel good about what you've seen the last two nights.

Next up, four games in Seattle:
> Loaiza - Meche
> Blanton - Felix Hernandez
> Zito - Moyer
> Harden - Pineiro

That Blanton-Hernandez matchup tomorrow looks to be the most interesting. A 25-year-old pitcher coming off a 200 IP / 3.53 ERA season against a pitcher one day shy of his 20th birthday coming off a phenomenal 84 IP / 2.67 ERA season. Two up-and-coming pitchers facing off early in the year - anything could happen. Should be worth watching.

Scoring a Double Play?

Watching the A's-Yankees again tonight - and Michael Kay just said that a play would have been a 6-6-3 double play if Jeter hadn't bobbled the ball off his face. He said the same thing last night about a play where Jeter fielded a grounder, stepped on second for the first out and threw to first for the second out of a double play. 6-6-3?

Isn't that just a 6-3 double play? Am I crazy here?

(And kudos to Jeter for turning two consecutive playable ground balls to his left into baserunners.)

Feeling Better About '06

Catfish Stew : Now That's More Like It

The A's won with some home runs, a walk, a bunt and a clutch hit--a multidimensional attack that can satisfy both sabermetricians and traditionalists. The fact that they are capable of playing a crisp, tense, mistake-free playoff-caliber game in early April fills me with all kinds of hope. It finally feels like the season has begun. -Ken Arneson

I couldn't agree more. I also like his quip that, "Ken Macha and my wife outmanaged Joe Torre." It's very curious that Rivera wasn't pitching the ninth inning. As far as high-leverage innings go, tied in the bottom of the ninth has got to be right up there. You have to use your relief ace in that situation, right?

Well, I've found tangotiger's chart of Crucial Situations. Scroll down to the bottom of the ninth. And check out the various situations - depending on the score, the runners on base and the number of outs, the leverage of the situation varies from low (blank) to medium (gray) to high (blue) to very high (red). Let's walk through the A's 9th inning last night.

Start of the inning, tied: medium leverage
Bradley walks: still medium leverage
Kendall sacrifices Bradley to second: high leverage
IBB to Swisher: high leverage
Scutaro's single: game over

I guess the game never made it to a "Very high" leverage situation, but do you really want Scott Proctor out there in even High leverage spots? How is that excusable when you've got Mariano Rivera out in the bullpen? Beats me. But I'll take the win. Today, we've got youngsters Dan Haren and Chien-Ming Wang facing off.

Holy Smokes

My mom has a website! Check out RuthKoch.com - she's got all her watercolor paintings up there for the viewing. I think Silver Breeze is my favorite, but the low-res image here doesn't do it justice. I recommend you buy a print!

Congrats Mom, and welcome to the internet.

(note - this post was originally authored, posted and taken down on 3/28/06)

Stumbling Out of the Gate

The A's opened the 2006 season last night and it could hardly have gone any worse, losing 15-2 to the Yankees. I keep looking through Susan Slusser's recap and the box score trying to find some kind of silver lining. I think I've finally found it: I was at dinner late last night and missed the game. I think that's it. The only good thing about last night's game was that I didn't watch it.

With that said, it is only one game, and Barry Zito started slowly last year as well. As I pointed out last May, Zito started '05 by giving up 22 ER in his first 30 innings (6.60 ERA). In fact, Zito has a 5.22 career ERA in April against a 3.27 ERA in all other months. So, let's hope Zito gets these early-season jitters out of the way and settles in to another solid year.