It is a new year for the A’s, but let’s hope their first series against the Mariners was not an accurate preview of what to expect in the coming year.
The A’s did not perform well in Friday’s and Saturday’s games losing 6-2 and 5-2, respectively.
Sunday’s game showed a bit of a bounce back as A’s managed a 7-1 victory on a day where the sun greatly aided the A’s cause. Luckily, the season is still young with 159 games still ahead.
It is difficult to tell what can truly be taken from the first three games of season, but let’s try nonetheless.
Coco Crisp is the real deal
Although three games is a small sample size, Crisp has carried his spring training success right into the regular season. So far he’s 5-12 with three runs scored and two extra base hits.
He finished Sunday a homer short of the cycle and has been the A’s best hitter thus far. Crisp had a marked impression on the A’s last season despite being on the DL nearly half the time. If he can stay healthy I would look for him to put up top numbers for an AL lead off man.
Defense needs step it up
This is an obvious one, the A’s committed seven errors in their first three games, five on opening night alone. This is probably not something to be worried about long term.
The A’s historically don’t play well on opening night and are still looking to get into sync. Defense is not something that changes for a player year to year without an injury. Rarely if ever, are players said to have a “career year” in defense.
So this is something that the A’s need not worry about unless the problem persists over a number of weeks. Kouzmanoff and Barton have committed multiple errors already this season but I expect them to be on their game shortly.
Starters are as good as advertised
Though the A’s dropped two out of three over the weekend, the starters were not at fault.
Cahill had the weakest showing, completing only 4.2 innings but he managed to strike out eight and only yield a single run. The 8 K’s was actually his second highest total for a start in his career.
If he can keep his strikeouts up and walks down he could improve upon last season. Gonzalez and Anderson both pitched admirably over the weekend; Anderson completed six innings and yielded only one run, while Gonzalez pitched seven full with a Ryan Langerhans home run his only blemish of the day.
Combined A’s starters when 1-0 with a 1.53 ERA and 17K’s in 17.2 innings.
Bullpen still has questions
By far the bullpen has been the weakest aspect of the A’s these first three games. This was suppose to be the A’s strength but they holds both the A’s losses this season.
Three games in is too early to panic, especially when one primary culprit is Craig Breslow, who had only a few appearances in spring training. He will improve once he gets into season shape.
The other question is Fuentes who had a solid spring until the Bay Bridge Series. Twice in his last two appearances has he yielded multiple runs and looks a bit out of sorts. Hopefully Bailey will return sooner than later so Fuentes won’t be forced into as many high pressure games. Again though, its too early to panic.
Performance of the Newcomers
The A’s major off season offensive additions consisted of David DeJesus, Josh Willingham and Hideki Matsui.
Three games in, and they’ve yielded various results.
Willingham started his A’s career with a bang, as he homered off of Felix Hernandez in his first AB. Overall he’s 3 for 11 with 3 RBI’s and 3 runs scored.
Matusi brought an 0 for into Sunday’s finale and managed a pair of hits including the 2500th of his career. Typically a slow starter, Matsui appears to be getting his bat up to speed.
David DeJesus is lagging behind the rest thus far having managed only one hit and one walk in 13 plate appearances. Though it is early it does seem like Ryan Sweeney should get a start to see what he can do after a very successful spring.
Remember, the season is only three days gone, and no drastic actions need to be taken so far. We’ll check back after the Toronto series to see how the A’s have fared in these areas.
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