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Athletics Feel Prepped for Longest Road Trip Through the AL West

The A's will play in second-place Houston next weekend and, for now, Mike Fiers is scheduled not to face his former team on whom he turned whistleblower over the 2017 sign-stealing scandal. Right after the Astros series comes the Aug. 31 trade deadline followed by three games in Seattle.
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No one will suggest that the A’s upcoming season-longest road trip is any kind of deal-breaker.

Yes, it’s 10 games long and fully one-sixth of the entire 2020 Oakland season. On the other hand, when you look at the often-postponed St. Louis Cardinals needing to play 53 games in 44 days just to get to 58 games by Sept. 27, the A’s swing through Texas, Houston and Seattle is, relatively speaking, just a walk in the park.

Still, these are important games. The three against the Astros next weekend, in particular, could have serious impact on the American League West pennant race with Houston currently in second place, 3½ games behind the A’s heading into Sunday. Oakland players and staff will warn against looking past the next game on the A’s schedule, Sunday in the Coliseum against the Angels, but this upcoming trip has been on their mind for a while now.

“We’ve had an eye on this thing the whole time anyway,” manager Bob Melvin said. “I think when we get back there will be maybe 20 games left in the season (21 actually). And obviously the further you go in the season, the more important every game is for us.

“So, this trip will be important for us. We know that, and you could see it right away on the schedule.”

Posed a question about the significance of the schedule, veteran left-handed reliever T.J. McFarland said the significance of the upcoming 10 days isn’t being lost in translation.

“This is the longest trip, so guys are going to be prepared for it,” McFarland said Sunday morning. “It’s all in-division teams, so this is a good road trip. I think everyone’s prepared, but I don’t think anyone’s looking too far ahead.

“I think we’re just going series by series, trying to win each series. If we keep winning series, good thing will happen, so that starts with today.”

Oakland is 6-3 in series to date, and two of the three series losses were in two-game series.

The A’s will open in Texas, a four-game set against the Rangers in the new Globe Life Field. Then come three games next weekend in Minute Maid Park against the Astros followed by an Aug. 31 off day and three more against the Mariners in T-Mobile Park. Beginning a week from Tuesday.

And while the A’s are saying they don’t want to look too far ahead, the Astros are sending their three best starters in terms of ERA (Zack Greinke, 1.84 entering a start Sunday; Framer Valdez, 1.72; and Cristian Javier, 3.55) at the A’s. Oakland will counter with Frankie Montas, Jesús Luzardo and Sean Manaea.

Mike Fiers, the member of the 2020 Astros team that spilled the beans on the Astros sign-stealing that led to general manager Jeff Luhnow and manager A.J. Hinch being fired and the franchise being assessed a $5 million fine and the forfeiture of their first- and second-round draft picks this year and next, won’t be pitching in this series.

He says he wouldn’t have any problem pitching against his old team, but it seems it’s likely that Fiers was put in the role of No. 3 starter this year in part because that meant, save for injury or other circumstance, he’d miss the Astros at least the first two times the team met.

And, looking ahead, if the A’s stick to their every-fifth-day rotation, Fiers also would miss the final meeting of the two teams, a four-game set in Oakland the first full week of September, pitching both the day before and the day after that series.

The off-day before the series opener in Seattle comes after the A’s will have played 30 games in 31 days. By comparison, September should be a breeze, if only because Oakland is down for three days off for the month, all of them crammed into an eight-day period between Sept. 14-21, after which there will be only six days left in the regular season.

“Once we come back home, we get most of our off days for the season,” Melvin said. “It’s the kind of a stretch where we should get a little bit of a breather.”

Follow Athletics insider John Hickey on Twitter: @JHickey3

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