Benny Sieu-USA TODAY Sports
On Tuesday, the Oakland Athletics and New York Yankees will open a three-game series in Oakland.
The match up pits two of the American League’s best teams at the moment — Oakland comes into the series at 38-27, while the Yankees sit at 37-26.
Tonight’s pitching matchup will pit Bartolo Colon (7-2, 3.14 ERA) against C.C. Sabathia (6-4, 3.74 ERA). Colon’s stats thus far in 2013 are stellar, so much so that you’d almost have to consider him the A’s top starter at the moment (even considering the current Biogenesis saga).
The 40-year old Colon will be looking to defeat his former employers. He went 8-10 with a 4.00 ERA in 2011 as a member of the Yankees before signing with Oakland prior to the 2012 season.
The three-game set will continue on Wednesday night when Phil Hughes (3-4, 4.80 ERA) will face the A’s and Dan Straily (3-2, 4.67 ERA), before concluding on Thursday afternoon with Hiroki Kuroda (6-5, 2.84 ERA) matching up with Jarrod Parker (5-6, 4.68 ERA).
This series will be a good test for the A’s. They just completed a stretch of 17 games in 17 days, a span in which they went 13-4. They dropped the final two games of a four-game set against the Chicago White Sox last weekend, but should come into Tuesday night’s game rested and ready to match up against one of their American League rivals, and one that has been playing at a high standard for most of the 2013 season thus far.
If the A’s can continue playing at the level they’ve exhibited for most of the past two weeks, it’ll go a long way toward defeating the “Evil Empire”.
Adrian Garro is an Oakland Athletics writer for RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter and/or add him to your network on Google.