The Battle for Third Place: DAY 4

OAK 5, SEA 0

The Battle for Third Place may have been lost last night, but the series has been won today. How about that? What is this, six out of seven series won since Crosby's return from the DL? Now this is the A's baseball I remember; fun, exciting and winning.

Last night, in the depths of despair from the dissapointing extra innings loss we were lamenting the status of our bullpen. We feared that since Saarloos was "five inning pitcher" the bullpen might be too depleted of fresh available arms to keep the game close once Saarloos was out of a game. We were resigned to accecpt a series split, and I am sure I wasn't the only one with a defeatist attitude last night. It was because we were absolutely sure that Saarloos can't go deep into a game.

Well Kirk Saarloos served up a lot of crow for us A's fans to eat today, and I, for one, will eat it with relish. Here's his pitching line:

K. Saarloos: 9 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 7 K

We didn't even need the bullpen today. His last two starts have been stellar and not only that he has been getting deeper and deeper into games, culminating in a four hit complete game shutout.

And now the A's come back home to face the BALCO Giants of San Francisco. In the history of inteleague play, the A's and Giants have been tied for the overall series. The Giants won the first series two out of three and I am more than confident that the A's will win this series. How about a sweep, so the A's can have the overall series lead by one game going into next year. We already have a better record than the Giants, lets now take the series.

Bay Area bragging rights are on the line. With the playoffs a longshot for both teams, this time, it counts.