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Athletics Bring the Brooms, Complete Sweep of Astros

By Jason Burke

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Bob Stanton-USA TODAY Sports

The Oakland Athletics completed the weekend sweep of the Houston Astros on Sunday afternoon with a win, 4-1. The A’s outscored the Astros 19-7 in the 3 game series, gathering 11 runs in the Friday contest and 4 each on Saturday and Sunday.

Sonny Gray (3-0) and Jesse Chavez (1-0) collected wins for starting pitchers. All 3 A’s starters  this series  (Gray, Kazmir and Chavez) sit with sub-2.00 ERA’s through 4 starts. The highest ERA of the bunch is Gray at 1.80.

Josh Reddick busted out of a slump, going 7-13 for the series with 3 RBI, which raised his Batting Average to .204. He also collected the game-winning hit in Saturday’s come-from-behind win.

During the game Sunday, Yoenis Cespedes left with a bruised right heel. He will most likely miss a couple of games, but avoid the DL, according to the Athletics Twitter feed.

The Athletics committed 6 errors in the series, 2 in each game. Moving forward the Athletics will have to play much sharper baseball if they want to keep winning. The Texas Rangers are coming to town next for a 3 game series, and their potent offense will not allow the Athletics to escape from these errors as often as the A’s have been getting away with them.

With the sweep, the Athletics complete a 5-1 week and currently sit at 13-5 and in first place in the AL West. In fact, the 13-5 mark is the best in the AL by 2.5 games. That is also the margin the A’s are up on the Rangers. We will have more on what’s coming up being posted on Monday morning to get you ready for a brand new week of Oakland Athletics baseball.

Thus far, the Athletics are riding high, and are playing well against the division. The first real test comes on Monday night when Yu Darvish takes on Dan Straily.

The Rangers are performing well this season despite a plethora of injuries. If the Athletics can just win the series, coupled with a 4 game series in Houston, they can be well on their way to opening up a sizable lead in the AL West by the end of April.