[thehatfield]

Next Up: 3-game series at home against Tampa Bay

Tampa Bay has won four of their last five games and overall have been hitting more consistently as a team since the All Star break but they are still wracked with injuries – six players are presently on the disabled list including their starting catcher, starting second baseman, and starting third baseman. The injury to catcher Ryan Garnet was what prompted Tampa to trade away Scott Kazmir, who had spent his entire career in a Rays uniform, for catcher Auggie Compton in a deal with the Milwaukee Brewers. 35-year old injured third baseman Tadasu Kamihara will see a string of three straight 40-home run seasons come to an end this year as he only managed 12 before his season-ending Achilles injury. Not only has Kamihara’s injury left a huge void in the middle of the Tampa lineup but since he’s sitting on 415 career home runs the injury probably makes 500 career home runs unreachable for the 4-time All Star and 5-time Gold Glove Award winner. The Rays have been spending money in the last couple of years to try and compete with the Yankees and Red Sox but the injuries have essentially negated that. On the bright side the injuries are allowing the organization to bring up and give a lot of playing time to just about all of their promising young players.

Our slumping lineup comes into this series salivating at the prospect of getting their hands on Tampa’s 24-year old rookie starter Claudio Rosatorres who is 0-3 with a 9.42 ERA in 5 starts since being called up from AAA and could be the needed tonic to get the bats back on track. 23-year old second year man Ricardo Colon, another lefty, is considered to be a big-time prospect. The #9 overall draft choice of the Cleveland Indians in 2016 was targeted by the Rays in the off-season and acquired back on July 9 for two solid prospects from Cleveland. Since coming to Tampa he’s 1-0 with a 3.50 ERA in three starts including 7.1 shutout innings against Seattle in his last start. 32-year old first baseman Shunen Nagao is trying to step up his game with all of the injuries and he currently leads the club with a .297 average, 22 home runs, and 75 RBI.


Thursday, August 5, 2021
Game 109 vs. Tampa Bay Devil Rays
5-4 Win; 31,205 in attendance
W: Dickson (16-2) L: Okasawa (5-8) H: von Schoening (10) SV: Mathis (33)

Recap: It wasn’t your typical beginning for Rowley Dickson as he plunked leadoff hitter Gregory Shoemaker and then surrendered a 401-foot laser beam shot to left-center field off the bat of 23-year old third baseman Milo Colburn to give Tampa Bay the early 2-0 lead. In the bottom of the first Teddy Revelez cut the lead to 2-1 with his 31st home run of the year off of So****su Okasawa. In the bottom of the 3rd inning Francisco Quinenes smacked a three-run shot 416 feet to deep left field to put us out in front 4-2. Revelez added another RBI with a double that plated a hustling Mumbles Yamasita from first base in the 4th inning to make the score 5-2. Tampa had worn Dickson out with over 100 pitches thrown through 6 innings so manager Jeff Hance brought Fairfax von Schoening into the game in the 7th inning for his second appearance since coming back from injury. After a shaky 7th where he walked a batter and threw a wild pitch, von Schoening surrendered a solo home run in the 8th to Shunen Nagao and then after getting two outs he loaded the bases and walked in a run to make the score 5-4. Hance then brought a virtually cold Bill Mathis into the game with two outs and the bases still loaded and Mathis struck out Shoemaker as we escaped the inning with the 5-4 lead. Mathis had a little trouble in the 9th as he gave up a double (he seems to do that a lot in the 9th) but after a couple of easy popouts we had once again had worked around a tough situation. Good game all around even though I have to admit there wasn’t complete confidence that Mathis would be able to get through the 8th inning without the game becoming tied.


Friday, August 6, 2021
Game 110 vs. Tampa Bay Devil Rays
9-0 Win; 31,481 in attendance
W: Knisley (13-8) L: Rosatorres (0-4)

Recap: While the bats did indeed come alive against rookie Rays starter Claudio Rosatorres the story of the game was the absolutely dominating performance of J.D. Knisley. The 34-year old lefty who can still consistently hit 96 m.p.h. on the radar gun had his best outing in an A’s uniform, dealing a 12 strikeout, one-hit shutout against the young Devil Rays. Auggie Compton’s single in the 3rd inning was the only hit but Knisley did allow three walks on an otherwise unbelievable evening. Edgard Galdames and Teddy Revelez both went 3-for-5, combining for 4 RBI and 3 runs scored. Ripley Johnson was 3-for-3 with an RBI and Francisco Quinenes was 2-for-4 with 2 RBI. Dan Volquez and Jose Arce also had 2 hits apiece while Larry Alison and Travis Byers went a combined 0-for-9. Tampa’s Rosatorres ended the game with 5.1 innings pitched, 10 hits allowed, 7 earned runs, and 2 walks. After the first three innings it didn’t look like Knisley would be able to finish the game as Tampa was working nearly every count full and J.D. was up over 60 pitches but he just started rolling and getting easy outs from the 4th inning on; it was really a fantastic, free-and-easy pitching performance from then on out. What was really nice about this game was that the young players on the bench and in the bullpen were genuinely excited for Knisley and it really showed in their smiling faces after the game.


Saturday, August 7, 2021
Game 111 vs. Tampa Bay Devil Rays
9-3 Win; 32,388 in attendance
W: Glaus (5-4) L: Vargas (5-10)

Recap: Edgard Galdames broke a 1-1 tie in the bottom of the 6th inning with a bases loaded double that scored two runs to give us a 3-1 lead. After Teddy Revelez was intentionally walked to load the bases again Francisco Quinenes came through with an RBI single to stretch the lead to 4-1. Tampa starter Jason Vargas was yanked in favor of reliever Hector Anzuatequi and Hector promptly uncorked a wild pitch to plate our 5th run of the game. After striking out Travis Byers, Anzuatequi gave up a 423-foot three-run blast to Jose Arce who deposited his 14th home run of the year into the left field seats. With the 8-1 lead manager Jeff Hance let Gib Glaus start the 7th inning and after a few base hits which led to two Devil Rays runs Hance visited the mound but stuck to his guns and let Glaus finish the 7th. Josh Frank came on and pitched a perfect 8th inning while striking out two batters and I think we’re just about ready to reach a consensus that Frank is going to be our “7th inning guy,” leading up to Fairfax von Schoening and Bill Mathis. Stacy Renteria pitched a scoreless 9th inning but he did issue a walk. Gib Glaus went 7 innings, allowing 3 runs (2 earned) on 5 hits and 2 walks while striking out 7. Player of the Game Edgard Galdames and second baseman Ripley Johnson again had 3 hits against the Devil Rays, as did Mumbles Yamasita who had an otherwise uneventful series. Galdames and Arce each had 3 RBI. Tampa’s Jason Vargas fell to 5-10 on the season.


Current Oakland Record: 73-38

We’re getting into August and we’ve lost 38 games – that’s just absurd. We came into this series looking like we were ready for a nice long slump but we just ran into some really bad Tampa Bay pitching that made us look really good. Each game we had a couple of guys looking helpless at the plate but still we weren’t lacking for runs. It left us feeling pretty good going into an off day on Sunday before a 3-game series on the road against the Angels.

In other news, Rich Harden threw 8 strong innings to pick up the 200th victory of his career in Baltimore’s 5-1 victory at home against the Seattle Mariners. Harden gave up just four hits and walked one while striking out 10 in his best outing of the year. After the game Harden admitted that he was relieved to finally reach the milestone and now he’ll be able to “relax and enjoy it.” But he bristled and ignored questions about not making a start while Baltimore was in Oakland earlier in the week, instead paying tribute to the Orioles fans that came out to the ballpark to support him on his historic day.