Houston Astros (91-63, first in the AL West) vs. Oakland Athletics (83-71, third in the AL West)
Oakland, California; Saturday, 4:07 p.m. EDT
PITCHING PROBABLES: Astros: Framber Valdez (11-5, 3.07 ERA, 1.26 WHIP, 115 strikeouts) Athletics: Sean Manaea (10-10, 4.05 ERA, 1.25 WHIP, 180 strikeouts)
LINE: Athletics +107, Astros -124; over/under is 8 1/2 runs
BOTTOM LINE: Oakland and Houston will square off on Saturday.
The Athletics are 41-38 in home games in 2020. Oakland has a collective batting average of .238 this season, led by Starling Marte with an average of .310.
The Astros are 44-35 in road games. Houston's lineup has 207 home runs this season, Yordan Alvarez leads them with 32 homers.
The Athletics won the last meeting 14-2. Frankie Montas earned his 13th victory and Marte went 4-for-5 with a double and four RBIs for Oakland. Brandon Bielak took his fourth loss for Houston.
TOP PERFORMERS: Matt Olson leads the Athletics with 147 hits and has 109 RBIs.
Yuli Gurriel leads the Astros with 161 hits and has 78 RBIs.
LAST 10 GAMES: Athletics: 6-4, .249 batting average, 3.36 ERA, outscored opponents by 14 runs
Astros: 7-3, .270 batting average, 4.07 ERA, outscored opponents by 22 runs
INJURIES: Athletics: Trevor Rosenthal: (chest), Daulton Jefferies: (elbow), Mike Fiers: (right elbow), Stephen Piscotty: (wrist), Mitch Moreland: (wrist).
Astros: Justin Verlander: (elbow), Andre Scrubb: (shoulder), Jake Odorizzi: (foot), Rafael Montero: (shoulder), Tyler Ivey: (undisclosed), Zack Greinke: (neck), Kent Emanuel: (elbow), Pedro Baez: (shoulder), Michael Brantley: (knee), Freudis Nova: (knee), Taylor Jones: (covid-19).
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The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.
