The A's and Joe Kennedy, who is 0-2 with a 3.18 ERA, take on the Mariners and Miguel Batista, who is 1-2 with an 8.83 ERA. The Mariners have already surpassed their win total against the A's from last year. Course, that wasn't hard considering the A's beat down the M's all year long. You didn't really think that would happen again this year, did you?
The A's don't really seem to have that much of a problem hitting Batista. The team average is .284 against Miguel and they have a .352 OBP against him. Course, that was before the A's were throwing out a mix of the Rockhounds and Rivercats. Here is the A's lineup today:
Stewart
Ellis
Chavez
Piazza
Johnson
Buck
Scutaro
Kendall
Putnam
It's a smart move by Geren moving Ellis up in this lineup against this pitcher. Ellis has hit Batista well in a tiny sample size, holding a 1.405 OPS against Batista.
The Mariners put this lineup out against Kennedy:
Suzuki
Beltre
Vidro
Ibanez
Sexson
Guillen
Johjima
Betancourt
Lopez
This could be the game that Kennedy gets smacked around, given that Sexson, Ibanez and Vidro all have an OPS over 1.000 against Kennedy. Granted, a lot of it is small sample size, but I don't think it's an accident that those three are back-to-back-to-back in the lineup.
So while we're all expecting a high scoring game, it will probably win up 2-0 again because that's baseball for you.
LET'S GO A'S!!!!!!!
