The San Francisco Giants and the Oakland A's, despite only eleven miles apart from one another, could not be on more opposite ends of the baseball world.
The Giants are not only one of the hottest teams in baseball, but they are one of the best teams in baseball. After taking two out of three games from the Philadelphia Phillies, the orange and black have 49 wins, which is tied for the most in the Majors alongside the Texas Rangers. The team has an eight-game lead over the Los Angeles Dodgers, and with the way, both teams have been playing, that lead may grow to double digits. Madison Bumgarner and Johnny Cueto have been putting up Cy Young numbers, Brandon Belt has come into his own, Buster Posey is Buster Posey. Even with multiple players going down due to injury, unsuspecting heroes have appeared out of thin air, not only keeping the Giants afloat, but leading the team to win after win.
Meanwhile, the A's have had a disaster of a season and wish they could have a fraction of San Francisco's success. Currently, the team is eleven games under .500, sitting in fourth place in the American League West, just above the equally lowly Los Angeles Angels by half a game. While there have been a couple of bright spots in the A's lineup, such as Danny Valencia, Steven Vogt, and Khris Davis, the team's biggest star, Sonny Gray, is having an abysmal first half of the season. Rich Hill, who is having a career-year even at the age of 36, has been hit by the injury bug and has not appeared in a game since May 29th. Fan favorite Josh Reddick is discussing a contract extension with the A's, but there is still a possibility he may be traded to a contender at the deadline if the two sides don't come to an agreement.
Even with the fact that these two squads have had completely different seasons, there is no downsizing the magnitude of this upcoming four-game series, as the A's have a chance to play spoiler during this four-game series by throwing off the Giants' momentum.
In the month of the June, the Giants have yet to lose a series, winning five and splitting two against the St. Louis Cardinals and the Boston Red Sox, who are both above .500.
If Oakland can outplay San Francisco and take three out of four games, or at least split the series, they can throw off the Giants momentum before two series against the Arizona Diamondbacks and one against the Colorado Rockies.
The more realistic possibility considering how both teams have played up to this point in time is that the Giants dominate, taking three or possibly sweeping. Oakland will have to go through Jeff Samardzija, Albert Suarez, Jake Peavy, and Madison Bumgarner to take this series.
Samardzija has been struggling in the month of June and is coming off of a start against the Pirates in which he allowed six runs over three innings, but the friendly confines of AT&T Park will help his cause. In his one start at AT&T in the month of June, he allowed two runs over 4.2 innings.
Suarez has done a solid job filling in for the injured Matt Cain, Peavy has looked like his Cy Young self in his past six starts, and, Bumgarner has pitched like an ace despite being handed losses in his past two starts.
Although strange, the Giants are 24-14 and 25-14 on the road, while the A's are 16-22 at home and 16-21 on the road.
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