Game Thread 149 - A's vs. Tigers

As baseballgirl mentioned yesterday, the A's will attempt to stave off the sweep today vs. Anibal Sanchez and the Tigers. This series, the Tigers have proven to be more ferocious than fluffy and cute, as they took the first two games of the series convincingly. On the one hand, this result isn't entirely surprising, as Max Scherzer was pitching as good as anyone in the AL and Justin Verlander is, well, himself. But, that belies the chances the A's did have in last night's game and the fact that Scherzer left in the 3rd inning on Tuesday.

Luckily, the Angels lost last night so the A's remain comfortably in the WC2 spot for now. Unfortunately, the M's did another patsy job in extra innings, and the Orioles continued their string of incredible extra inning luck, winning 3-1, causing the O's to leapfrog the A's in the win column. That said, I don't see any advantage to being WC1 or 2 aside from the bragging rights. But make no mistake -- this playoff appearance the A's are gunning for is by no means set. In fact, I'd say today all but a must win game. Going into New York this weekend, facing Sabathia tomorrow, and the spector of Brett Anderson missing time make every game important.

Here are the lineups from BaseballPress.com. Crisp is out again with Reddick playing CF. I don't buy the whole idea that one guy changes a lineup, but the lineup does look a lot better with Crisp leading off and playing CF. Or at least, anything from Drew leading off.