Is this the perfect storm? A red-hot Oakland burning through the Midwest like a grass-fire against a fading Royals team led by the feeble remains of former pitching prospect Zack Greinke?
After a horrendous, yet wholly expected, three-game sweep in Boston, manager Buddy Bell had this bit of wisdom to impart to the media:
``Our inexperience really showed,'' Kansas City manager Buddy Bell said. ``We were really pitching away from contact. You can't do that.''Umm, ok. I'm not sure pitching to contact is exactly the answer, especially in front of an Angel Berroa-led defense. What, the old-fashioned "throwing strikes" isn't good enough? Its been painfully clear all season that the Royals have employed a kind of semi-destructive pitch-to-contact strategy, which has resulted in OK walk totals, paltry K-rates across the board, and lots and lots of runs allowed.
Tonight its the aforementioned Zach/k Gre/inke (3-13, 6.14 ERA) against journeyman Kirk Saarloos (7-6, 4.06 ERA), in a battle of subtly difficult to spell hurlers. I've been writing about Greinke for three years and can't ever remember how to spell either his first or last name. Actually, I'm a little better on "Greinke", but habitually misspell Zack/h. Needless to say, now that dude's sporting a season ERA above 6.00 in August, I'm less quick to make sure I'm spelling King Z's name correctly.
For the record, Greinke's 1-0 in 2 career starts against the A's, with a sparkling 2.25 ERA in 12 IP.
During this series, I invite all loyal Royals Review readers to swing over to my Sports Blogs comrade site Athletics Nation and talk lots of non-hateful smack about how the Royals rule and the A's drool.