The A's and King Richard the Lionharden with a 3-0 record and a 3.58 ERA take on the Rangers and Kameron Loe with an 0-2 record and a 5.40 ERA.
The A's look to get vengeance for their 2-1 series loss in Oakland by winning today's game and taking the series from the Rangers. The team has lost 10 of 14 since winning five of the first seven and things aren't going to be any easier with Milton Bradley now out of the lineup. He was one of the only A's performing adequately with the bat.
The team may have a lot of home runs, but it also has the fewest doubles in the majors, has the third lowest on-base percentage and the fourth lowest slugging percentage. That has a bigger impact than you can imagine when the team is playing one-run games every night. Last night was the fourth straight one-run game in a row. The team is 4-6 is one-run games so far this season.
As for Swisher and Chavez, even with Chavez's bad night, they are still hitting .312 with 17 home runs and 37 RBI. The rest of the team is hitting .203 with 10 home runs and 46 RBI.
The lineup minus The Gamer, looks like this:
Kotsay
Swisher
Chavez
Thomas
Payton
Crosby
Johnson
Kendall
Ellis
Hopefully The Big Hurt wakes up out of his funk very soon because the A's need the old Frank Thomas, not the aging Frank Thomas.
King Richard faces the Texas lineup with Mench having gone five homers in five games now:
Matthews
Young
Teixeira
Nevin
Blalock
Mench
Brown
Laird
Meyer
Someone please tell Nevin he was supposed to be washed up after leaving San Diego? I guess Texas can do that to a lot of hitters.
LET'S GO OAK-LAND!!!!!!!
