Good evening, and welcome to another exciting night of A's baseball. I'm baseballgirl and I'll be your host for Monday, Wednesday and Friday's contests, so either we're going to have a great week together, or we're going to all be bitter. No pressure, A's.
In case you missed the roster moves today:
— Oakland Athletics (@Athletics) August 20, 2012
#Athletics reinstate Brett Anderson from the DL; option Dan Straily to Sacramento; designate Anthony Recker for assignment.
The A's will try run their modest win streak to five in a row tonight as the Minnesota Twins stroll into town, looking to spoil the A's postseason party. The A's, on the other hand, look to keep their magical season alive; they are an unbelievable 10 games over the .500 mark, just 5 games behind the Division-leading Rangers, 4 games ahead of the epically-melting-down Angels, and just a half game out of the Wild Card. If you're scoreboard-watching, it's allowed. It's now late August, and the A's are in the playoff race; enjoy it!
The Minnesota Twins are 20 games under .500 and the A's should capitalize on this. The upcoming A's schedule is brutal as they face some tough, good teams, one in particular looking for payback (ahem...New York...ahem), so they should probably take advantage of the teams that they should beat. What they couldn't make happen against the Royals, they made happen against the Indians, so they need to keep that momentum. A win tonight would put the A's 11 games over .500, and would be their high-water mark of the year.
The Twins will throw Brian Duensing against the A's tonight. He has struggled this year, both as a starter and a reliever, and the A's need to capitalize on this. Brandon McCarthy will be facing off against Duensing; McCarthy has been robbed of a win in the late innings of both of his starts since returning off the DL. The "good" bullpen should be rested after deep starting pitching performances this weekend, so McCarthy will have some relief should he need it.
If you are scoreboard watching, keep an eye on the White Sox (vs. NYY at 5PM), the Rays (vs. KC at 4PM), Orioles and Rangers (who play each other at 5PM; root for Texas in this one); the Angels and Tigers are off today.
Here are your lineups:
LET'S GO OAK-LAND!
