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05/25/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Year after year, the Oakland Athletics have churned out solid young pitchers from their farm system in assembly-line fashion.
This year has been no different, as Oakland's pitching staff ranks third in the American League with a combined 3.92 ERA. The starting rotation boasts an average age of 26.7 years, which is the youngest in the majors. Dallas Braden, owner of a perfect game already this season, is the second-oldest pitcher in the rotation, at just 26.
"You look in the winter at all the top-notch pitching free agents and see how few real top-notch guys are available." manager Bob Geren said in a recent interview with the team's Web site. "To be able to grow your own and see them blossom into that style of pitching is a credit to numerous people."
That development begins at the lower levels of Oakland's minor league system, where the coaches emphasize preparing the pitching prospects with the tools, and mindset, needed to make it to The Show. Once there, A's pitching coach Curt Young takes the reins and further fine-tunes those skills, closely monitoring each pitcher's progression.
Young is in his seventh season as Oakland's pitching coach. Over the past six seasons under his tutelage, the A's pitching staff has allowed the fewest home runs in the American League (909), has the lowest opponent batting average (.259) and ranks second in ERA (4.10).
Prized free agent acquisition Ben Sheets (31) saw his Oakland tenure get off to a rocky start, and things came to a head during a two-game stretch a few weeks ago when he allowed a combined 17 runs.
On Sunday, Sheets baffled the Bay Area-rival San Francisco Giants by allowing just two hits in six innings, striking out eight along the way. It marked the second straight shutout of the Giants, after 24-year-old Gio Gonzalez tossed eight scoreless innings in Saturday's 1-0 victory.
All told, A's pitchers held the Giants to just one run in sweeping the three- game series over the weekend. San Francisco was held scoreless for the final 20 innings of the series.
Since giving up those 17 runs, Sheets has allowed a total of seven runs over his last four starts, to which he credits an adjustment with his arm angle. Manager Bob Geren also pointed to Sheets developing his cut fastball and relying on his changeup more frequently. While the numbers certainly suggest the veteran right-hander has turned a corner, Sheets said he is only now starting to feel more at ease on the mound, which is evident by his increased velocity.
"I'm just feeling a lot better from start to start," he told the Oakland Tribune. "When I look back at month to month to month, I can really tell a big difference. The more you do something, the more comfortable you feel at it. It feels good, because I think I'm starting to settle in."
Thanks to Sheets and the rest of the pitching staff, the A's have won three straight to move above .500 (23-22), as they trail the division-leading Texas Rangers by just two games. Now, the A's pitchers look to keep dealing as the team embarks on a 10-game road trip through Baltimore, Detroit and Boston.
RANGERS SHUFFLE STARTING ROTATION
Rangers' manager Ron Washington has been searching for another lefty bullpen option to go along with Darren Oliver. It appears the search has ultimately landed on starter Matt Harrison, who learned he will join the bullpen upon his return from the disabled list.
Harrison, who has not made a relief appearance since 2006, began a rehab assignment in Double-A on Monday. Barring any setbacks, he could join the team in his new role as early as Friday in Minnesota. In six starts for the Rangers this season, Harrison went 1-1 with a 5.29 ERA before being shutdown with left biceps tendinitis.
"I really don't know what to expect," he told the Star-Telegram. "I talked to (Dustin) Nippert. He said it's different because every time the phone rings down there, your adrenalin gets going. It's something I'm going to have to experience firsthand, and hopefully the minor league games will help."
In other pitching news, Washington announced over the weekend that he had switched C.J. Wilson and Derek Holland in the rotation. Wilson will now pitch Saturday against the Twins, while Holland will pitch Sunday, giving him seven days off between starts. The team has two open dates this week, which opened the possibility for such a move.
After winning the first five games of their seven-game homestand, the Rangers lost consecutive games this weekend against the Chicago Cubs by identical 5-4 finals. Thus far the road has not been very kind to the Rangers, who are 18-9 at home but just 7-11 elsewhere.
PROBLEMS AT THE TOP FOR SEATTLE
The box scores show that Seattle managed just two runs over the final 22 innings of this weekend's series with the San Diego Padres. And with that, the Mariners are now just 5-16 in May and have not won a series all month long.
Chone Figgins was acquired in the offseason with the hope that he'd team up with leadoff man Ichiro Suzuki to give Seattle a formidable 1-2 punch at the top of the lineup. However, that plan hasn't quite worked out, which is just one of the many reasons Seattle (16-28) now has the second-worst record in the American League.
According to the team's Web site, Suzuki and Figgins have both reached base only 17 percent of the innings which they've batted consecutively. Of course, it's tough to fault Suzuki, who is hitting .348 and has 22 multi-hit games. Figgins, a former leadoff man with the Angels, is hitting just .195 with a team-high 42 strikeouts in the No. 2 hole.
Although Figgins doesn't blame his struggles on his new home in the lineup, one can't help but correlate the two. After all, he is a career .291 hitter and is coming off an All-Star nod last season -- which is why the team gave him $36 million over four years. Still, despite the team's well-documented offensive struggles, Figgins isn't putting any added pressure on himself. What's more, he evens claims he's been swinging the bat better lately.
"My mind-set never changes no matter where I am (in the order)," Figgins told the Seattle Times. "I think times like this show you what you're made of. I'm not the kind of guy that's going to give in. I'll never give in. I'm going to go out and keep playing.
"That's who I am. I've always been like that. Stuff never comes easy. If you can realize that and battle through the hard times you can get rewarded."
ANGELS MISSING SOME FORMER STARS
The early polls are in for the 2010 All-Star ballots, and so far the results should be of particular interest to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.
Among the leading vote-getters at their respective positions are the Rangers' Vladimir Guerrero and the Yankees' Mark Teixeira, two key figures of the Angels' not-so-distant past.
Teixeira, who hit .358 and had a .632 slugging percentage in 54 games with the Angels in 2008, is the leading vote-getter at first base thus far, nearly 138,000 votes ahead of Minnesota's Justin Morneau.
Guerrero, an eight-time All-Star with the Halos, has rebounded from his knee problems to hit .339 with 10 homers and 37 RBI in his first year as the Rangers' designated hitter. He leads the voting at DH with 374,333 tallies. Ironically, the Angels' new DH, Hideki Matsui, ranks second with 298,487 votes.
However, Matsui's votes can be credited more so to his reputation than to his production thus far. He was hitting just .161 in the Month of May entering Monday's series opener against the Toronto Blue Jays. With Toronto left-hander Brett Cecil on the hill for that game, Angels' manager Mike Scioscia dropped Matsui to seventh in the lineup. That change, it appears, will remain in place until Matsui picks things up at the plate.
"Against lefties right now, we want to keep Juan (Rivera) behind Kendry (Morales) so Hideki will hit behind Juan against lefties, and most likely hit higher against righties," Scioscia said. "I talked to Hideki (Monday), and I think when he starts swinging it, we'll get him in the middle of the lineup. Right now he's searching, and so against lefties we'll go with this lineup."
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Hurtado,
My fellow Americans, as tempting as it may be to don the coat and HD-ready tie in order to deliver this State of the Game address before the cameras, I know better. As Brad Paisley sings on his latest album, "I'm so much cooler online."
The ideas for this annual essay to kick off the MySportsbook.com college football betting preview flowed like frat-house beer, which is to say they were cheap and spilled all over the floor. The 2007 season will be better than 2007, if only because there will be more of it. A year ago, the NCAA Football Rules Committee made two rule changes in the interest of speeding up the game. These changes went over like Kobe burgers at a vegan banquet.
To its credit, the rules committee rectified its mistakes. This season the clock once again will start when a kickoff is received, rather than when it is kicked, and the clock will not start so quickly on a change of possession.
However, kickoffs have been moved back five yards, to the 30, which will force more returns. (Thus forcing the clock to run. Clever, huh?) Special teams might decide a lot of games, because coaching strategy will come straight out of another new Paisley lyric (almost), I'd like to check you for kicks.
Paisley sings with a twang, which is why he's appropriate for this college football season. The sun coming up over the 2007 college football betting lines season rises from the south. It's a Southern football world. As the Southeastern Conference begins its 75th year, the power shift is noticeable.
Eight-figure budgets, glamorous settings -- and that's just for the head coaches. The SEC has four coaches who have won national championships -- the greatest aggregation of coaching know-how since Eddie Robinson dined alone.
Steve Spurrier, Phil Fulmer, Nick Saban and Urban Meyer have given lie to the idea that a conference championship game is too daunting a hurdle on the road to No. 1. In six of the past 10 seasons, the national champions played and won a conference championship game -- three of the six (Tennessee, 1998; LSU, 2003; Florida, 2007) from the SEC.
There will be more of the same this season, if the preseason prognostications are correct. Six SEC teams are in the preseason coaches' poll, more than from any other conference. Only one conference has talent so deep that a team with 15 returning starters, including the best quarterback in the league, from an eight-win season is considered an afterthought. That may speak more to Kentucky's losing legacy than to the wisdom of the predictions, but there you have it. And seriously, keep an eye on Wildcats QB Andre' Woodson.
The reach of the South extends all the way to No. 1. Take a look at the team that is a consensus pick to win the national championship. The quarterback is from Shreveport. The best wide receiver is from Nashville. The top recruit is from New Orleans.
So what's the campus doing in Los Angeles? Hey, it is the University of Southern California.
USC lost two Pacific-10 Conference games a year ago, the first time that had happened in five seasons, and university officials withstood the urge to form blue-ribbon panels to unearth the cause of such a disaster. Instead, the Trojans gathered themselves and routed Michigan, 32-18, in the Rose Bowl.
USC's losses at Oregon State and at UCLA last year should have given pause to those who question the Pac-10's football prowess (such as, without naming names, L.M. from Baton Rouge). The league only got deeper this season; Dennis Erickson is taking over an Arizona State team that never quite got out of its own way under his predecessor, Dirk Koetter.
Erickson will resume his quest to become the first coach to win a national championship at two schools. Both he and Spurrier, now in his third season at South Carolina, returned to college football at schools with lower profiles than where they won their titles.
That isn't the case for the third coach looking for the national championship double. You may have missed this, but NASA reported the astronauts on the space shuttle last spring made contact with what can only be described as beings from another galaxy.
The leader of the aliens said, "We come in peace," followed by, "So how do you think Nick Saban will do at Alabama?"
The public is reacting to the new Crimson Tide coach as if he is the Barry Bonds of college football -- beloved at home for what his fans believe he is going to do, hated on the road for his intimidating attitude and for what his detractors believe he did (bend NCAA recruiting rules). I made this comparison from the dais at a charity dinner in Mobile, Ala., last month, and the chill that washed over me didn't come from the air conditioning.
Saban will attempt to prove that he can remake in Tuscaloosa what he built in Baton Rouge, much like another member of the national championship fraternity. Bobby Bowden is attempting to remake at Florida State what he built at, um, Florida State. Bowden rebuilt his offensive staff, bringing in four new coaches led by Saban's former offensive coordinator, Jimbo Fisher, to jump-start an offense that has been dead for a couple of years.
The Atlantic Coast Conference is expected to show new signs of life, too. That is said with no disrespect toward last season's champion, Wake Forest, which provided one of the best story lines of 2007. The Demon Deacons begin this season in their customary position, overshadowed by the Virginia Techs, Miamis and Florida States.
It's not that Wake will find it difficult to duplicate its success in 2007 as much as the feeling that success engendered. Surprising success is the narcotic of sport. It never feels quite so euphoric the next time. Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese has figured this out. He refers to 2007, when a league looked down upon by fans and foes alike took three undefeated teams into November, as "Cinderella."
The fairy tale may be over, but the Big East has four genuine Heisman Trophy candidates in Louisville quarterback Brian Brohm, West Virginia tailback Steve Slaton and quarterback Pat White, and Rutgers tailback Ray Rice. Rutgers, as did Wake Forest and, of course, Boise State, proved last season that the have-nots in college football occasionally have quite a lot.
The Broncos' rousing 43-42 overtime victory over Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl has raised the profile of all schools in conferences that don't get automatic BCS bids. This season, TCU and Hawaii are the preseason favorites to burst through the BCS doors and earn an at-large bid. The Warriors return 14 starters from an 11-3 team, including quarterback Colt Brennan.
Brennan not only broke the single-season record with 58 touchdown passes in 2007, but he also led Division I-A in passing efficiency (186.0). The senior is expected to contend for the Heisman Trophy, and neither his success nor the rise of his team should come as any surprise in the 2007 season.
After all, Hawaii is the southernmost team in the country.
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