The Oakland Athletics have the best defensive team top to bottom in the American League. They've proven it all season long with key plays and have nearly gold glove quality defense at almost every position when the team is healthy.
The Angels, well, they do not. They have the second most number of errors in baseball with 82 and have routinely given opposing teams more outs.
For one night only, the A's switched jerseys with the Angels and gave the team not one, but two unearned runs, which turned out to be the difference in the game. Listen, both these teams are so evenly matched with their offensive flaws that you know that most of the time it's going to be a low scoring game when these teams match up. Both teams have very good to great starting pitching and bullpens, both have mediocre offenses (although Anaheim has been very good in July in large part because of the monster known as Juan Rivera) and one of the great divides between the two teams this season has been defense.
Blanton pitched wonderfully, if only he could've made better plays in the field. The good news is that Joe has pitched extremely well three of his last four outings. If Haren and Blanton can continue and Zito remains consistent, this team should be fine. Although...the team goes into a game tomorrow with Loaiza and his nearly 7 ERA against Escobar and his sub-4 ERA.
