ARLINGTON, Texas — Recent news may not have much of an impact on the current year’s squad, but the Oakland Athletics baseball franchise could be in its waning days.
With the Athletics agreeing to a land purchase in Nevada with their sights now set on moving the franchise to Las Vegas in the coming years, the team probably couldn’t handle news much worse than that even as they’ve struggled to a 3-16 record which has them firmly in last place in the American League West.
Unfortunately, the games still have to be played, and fortunately for Texas, the Athletics’ schedule takes them through Arlington for the weekend.
Where Oakland’s coming from
The A’s are riding a seven-game losing streak. They just finished up a homestand at the Oakland Coliseum with series losses to both the New York Mets and Chicago Cubs. Prior to that, they lost three of four to Baltimore and were swept by Tampa Bay. It’s not a great time to be an Athletics fan.
If you’re on the lookout for “the next big thing” for the Athletics, however, Oakland potentially has a few of those to keep an eye on.
Outfielder Esteury Ruiz has come out of the gate strong for Mark Kotsay’s club, combining top-tier speed with an excellent hit tool. All of that has the 24-year old Dominican at the top of the lineup for the A’s after his inclusion in the trade that shipped catcher Sean Murphy to Atlanta.
In his last 10 games, Ruiz is 13-for-34 with a double, five RBI, and four stolen bases. That’s a .382/.447/.412 slash line during a difficult stretch for the A’s. For the season, Ruiz is hitting over .300 after logging 19 hits in Oakland’s first 19 games. Keeping the rookie off the bases is going to be a key during this series.
Pitching prospect Mason Miller made his MLB debut in Wednesday’s loss to the Cubs. Even though he finished with a no decision, Miller made waves with his electric fastball. Texas will miss Miller in this series but he’s a hurler to watch out for in the division.
Another player that Texas will not have to worry about in this series is outfielder Ramon Laureano. Laureano strained his left groin on April 17 and was placed on the injured list. Laureano had been hitting .235/.316/.471 with four doubles, two homers and four RBI.
The six-year veteran Laureano has been a .261/.336/.503 lifetime hitter against the Rangers with 13 homers. Those are hardly Ranger-killer numbers, but he was the A’s hitter that Texas was most familiar with.
Things to watch for
Game 19, 7:05 PM CST: JP Sears (0-1, 4.60 ERA) vs. Jon Gray (1-1, 3.21 ERA)
Game 20, 6:05 PM CST: Shintaro Fujinami (0-3, 11.37 ERA) vs. Andrew Heaney (1-1, 4.97 ERA)
Game 21, 1:35 PM CST: Kyle Muller (0-1, 7.23 ERA) vs. TBD
The series opener on Friday will see Jon Gray set foot on the mound for the first time since taking a 109 mph comebacker off his pitching arm against Houston last Saturday. Perhaps the same sports deity that helped Josh Smith avoid a serious injury after getting hit in the jaw with a pitch earlier in the year must also be watching over Gray.
Despite fearing a broken arm, Gray suffered nothing more than a bruised elbow and a shortened start in Houston. Forced to leave that game after two innings, Gray is sporting a 3.21 ERA in 14 innings pitched spanning three starts. Gray has yet to allow more than two runs in a start.
Another pitcher taken out of his previous start early was Jacob deGrom. The Rangers’ ace left a pending no-hit performance against the Royals after four innings with what was diagnosed as right wrist soreness.
deGrom said afterwards that if it was a more meaningful game, he probably could have pitched through it. This early in the year, the pitcher and the team decided it would be best not to push it. Notably, though, the pitcher listed for Texas on Sunday is still “To Be Determined.” Despite plans for deGrom to make that start, it has not been made official as of yet.
On the offensive side, Marcus Semien goes up against his old club for the first time in 2023. Last season, in 19 games against the Athletics, Semien was a .253/.330/.494 hitter with 19 RBI and for homers. The year before, as a member of the Toronto Blue Jays, Semien was a .333 hitter in seven games.
Semien enters this game on an absolute tear, riding a six-game hitting streak with a ridiculous slash line of .478/.571/.913, including three homers and 11 RBIs. The Rangers needed their other keystone combination veteran to step up in Corey Seager’s absence and Semien has risen to the occasion.
Top to bottom through the lineup, the Rangers are having an incredibly good run. They are second in the American League in runs scored, have struck out the third fewest times behind Tampa Bay and Cleveland, and possess the second best record in the AL thanks in part to their 6.2 runs per game average.
With Seager on the shelf, names like Jonah Heim (6-for-16 in his last six), Travis Jankowski (5-for-19) and Josh Jung (7-for-25) have been stepping up and the Rangers have scored 45 runs in the last six games. Against an Oakland team that has had an historically poor start, the goal should be to continue their run.
Do you think the Rangers will get full outings from their starting pitchers in this series? Share your predictions with Matt on Twitter @FisherWritesMLB.
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