Scott Garceau: O's Future Is Now
The Oakland A's have the best record in the American League and have scored more runs than any team in baseball. The Toronto Blue Jays lead the East; they have the second best record in the league and rank third of the 30 MLB teams in runs scored. There's plenty of thunder in those bats but hardly a whimper when the A's and Jays got shutdown by Orioles rookie Kevin Gausman this week. In Birdland the future is now!
Gausman is dealing, Dylan Bundy is recovering and the "grow the arms" garden is blooming. Bundy the top pitching prospect in baseball before his Tommy John surgery may be a factor in the second half of this season, if not this summer Bundy should be a contributor in 2015. Gausman is right here right now!
Buck Showalter was vague about Gausman's role during the manager's post-game press conference Thursday night but you don't have to be Connie Mack to figure out the right-hander just might be the best of Buck's starting bunch and he'll continue to get the ball until further notice. In back to back starts against the A's and Jay's Gausman has 2 wins and gave up only 2 runs in 13 innings.
While Orioles fans are begging for more Gausman, Toronto manager John Gibbons might sign up for less. Here's what Gibbons had to say after getting beat Thursday night. "Gausman was good tonight. He's got that overpowering fastball. He was keeping it in the zone. I think in the past he's had some control issues, but it's all coming together for him."
And it couldn't come together at a better time. With Chris Tillman and Ubaldo Jimenez underperforming and Miguel Gonzales on the DL, Gausman's was the shot in the arm the rotation needed. Two games doesn't pave a path to Cooperstown, after all Gausman has a career ERA over 5 but maybe the Toronto manager is right and it's all coming together for the 23-year old.
He doesn't have to be Tanaka, Sale or Scherzer good, but if Kevin Gausman can come close to being the guy we've watched tame the A's and Jays he could be around for a long time and the Orioles might be playing post-season baseball for the second time in three years.
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