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On Deck: O’s vs. A’s

I hope everyone had their brooms out for today’s sweep of the Blue Jays!  It was great to see the O’s take down a divisional rival—the first time the Blue Jays were swept at Camden Yards since 1994!

The one thing that I have been thinking about over the past few days is a quote from Aubrey Huff right after he signed.  He mentioned he was impressed how balanced the O’s line up was going to be this season.  As I watch the games and look at the hitting stats, so far there is very little dependence on any certain player on a hot streak.  Even the bench guys who have been filling in for the regulars have found some timely hits. 

The question on my mind is which Orioles offense is the real one.  Perhaps after a slow start, it’s finally showed up… and which will show up to face the Oakland Athletics?

 

Monday, April 23

Erik Bedard will welcome to Oakland A’s to Baltimore on Monday evening.  We still haven’t seen Bedard find his stride yet; his 5.40 ERA and 1.56 WHIP are both much higher than they will be by the season’s end.  However, despite not having his best stuff, Bedard is 3-1, largely due to his 25 strikeouts.  That leaves him tied for fourth with Boston’s Josh Beckett for most strike outs in the American League.  Bedard’s going to find his groove soon enough and we’ll see that ERA and WHIP plummet.

In the past, Bedard has been pretty average when facing the Athletics.  He is 0-1 with a 4.32 ERA in 4 career games.  The current A’s batters have only batted a combined .151 against the O’s Ace. 

It is even lower when you take out Dan Johnson’s 4 for 6 (.667 BA) with two home runs and 6 RBIs.  Johnson is on the 15-day DL and is expected to doing a minor league rehab stint while the A’s are in Baltimore.  (Johnson’s two home runs are the only from any current A’s player against Bedard.)

For the A’s, Dan Haren will be taking the mound.  Haren has been great for Oakland this year.  Haren has a 1.44 ERA in four games.  He has only given up four runs over 25 innings.  His worst outing was 5.0 innings with 3 runs against the Yankees.  Despite the great numbers, the A’s haven’t provided much run support for Haren leaving him 1-2 so far in 2007.

Haren’s career numbers against the O’s look very similar to Bedard’s and the A’s.  He is 1-2 with a 4.30 ERA in four games.  Baltimore faced him once last year.  The O’s chased him out of the game after five innings and four runs to pick up a win.

There isn’t any real stand out numbers against Haren.  Chris Gomez is 2-3 with 2 doubles and 2 RBIs, which may make this an ideal start for him.  Markakis is also 2 for 3 and Jay Gibbons has batted .286 in 14 at bats.  Mora has only hit 2 for 18, but both hits were home runs.

Tuesday, April 24

Oakland’s Rich Harden is currently scheduled to make the start in Baltimore.  Harden hasn’t pitched since April 15th when left a strong performance against the Yankees due to stiffness in his shoulder.  The San Francisco Chronicle reported that Harden needs to feel well enough to get a side session in on Sunday if he will pitch on Sunday.  If not, Brad Halsey will likely make his start.

Harden is a lefty who was off to a good start.  He is 1-1 with a low 1.42 ERA in three games.  Harden has never pitched at Camden Yards and has only faced the Birds twice, a game each in 2003 and 2004, where he is 0-0 with a 0.69 ERA.  The current Orioles have only faced Harden a handful of times.  Huff leads the pack with 16 at bats and a .563 BA with four doubles and 1 homer.

Halsey is a lefty currently with the Sacramento River Cats where he has pitched well (2-0, 2.65 ERA).  In the Majors, Halsey has split time between starting and the bullpen.  As a starter, he has a 5.00 ERA in 40 games.  The Orioles have only faced him in relief—two games where he pitched two innings with no ERs.

The O’s starter is also still undecided, though Jeremy Guthrie is likely.  Brian Burres was also mentioned, but after pitching in Sunday’s game, I doubt he is still a possibility.  Guthrie has looked well from the bullpen, having picked up a win in relief with a 3.38 ERA and seven strike outs.  The only cause for concern is his high WHIP (1.63) due to 9 hits and 4 walks in only 8 innings.

With a spot starter on Tuesday, we’re likely going to see a good bit of our $42 million bullpen.  We know they are good… but what do the numbers say?  (Rankings are in the American League, unless otherwise noted.  Also, they do not include any numbers from Sunday games.)

• A 2.59 ERA puts them 5th in the Majors and 2nd (behind Boston’s 2.48 ERA) in the American League.
• With 54 strike outs, they are first in the league and tied for first in MLB with the Florida Marlins.
• Tied for 3rd with 6 saves.
• Tied for second for the least amount of ERs given up with 17.
• Allowed 18 base on balls, a 4th place tie with Seattle.
• A 1.14 WHIP ties them for second with the Yankees.
• Given up only 3 home runs (5th place)

Those are some really impressive numbers.  I’m not one to cherry pick stats, but those numbers would even be better when you take out the two outlier games—the blow up in New York and the late inning loss to Detroit.  But those games are going to happen occasionally.  It’s just nice to know that it is the exception, rather than the expectation like 2006.

Overall, the Orioles have been playing some great baseball and have been a lot of fun to watch.  Despite facing last year’s AL West Division Champion, I think this could be another good series for the Birds.

Also, don’t miss Mike’s discussion of the Orioles broadcast radio woes!

Athletics hat photo from www.seatseek.com

Jeremy Guthrie photo from www.baltimoresun.com

This entry was posted on Monday, April 23rd, 2007 at 1:00 am and is filed under Series Preview, Oriole Players, Oriole Magic!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.