Ben Sheets is now 2-0. The Athletics have beat the Yankees three straight to open their series. Although I can’t be sure, I’m going to have to guess that I’ll be playing a Nintendo Gamecube tomorrow, as soon as I finish the last chapter of the latest Harry Potter book.

Yes, it is true, we have seemingly done a time-warp into the first decade of the 21st century. The Aughts, as they are sometimes called, since saying “The 2000s” is kind of unclear as to whether you are talking about the decade or the century.

The Aughts were good to the Oakland Athletics and to Ben Sheets, but they had fallen on hard times by the 2010s. Now, however, they seem to be turning things around.

Ben Sheets looked like he’d be a pitcher for the Aughts. In 2000, he was an Olympic hero, slaying the once-thought-invulnerable Cuban squad with a complete game shutout to win the USA a gold medal. By the next year, he was up with Milwaukee, where it looked like he had a bright future ahead of him. And, in some ways, he did. Sheets was always pretty good, but it was rare that he was great, as he was always hampered by injuries and a lack of run support- he ended his career in Milwaukee with a 86-83 record and a 3.72 ERA, although he also had four All-Star Game selections, including a start in 2008’s All-Star Game in Yankee Stadium. It was in 2008 where Ben Sheets suffered yet another injury late in the season, taking him out of the playoffs and ending his time with the Brewers.
A comeback in 2010 with the Athletics was disastrous, and so everybody thought he was done.

Well, apparently he is not done, because in two games (12 IP) with Atlanta, he has yet to give up a earned run and given up only seven hits. This could be quite the comeback story in the making.

Meanwhile, in Oakland, the Athletics have surged this month to a 13-2 record that has catapulted them into the AL Wild Card race. This is primarily due to good pitching: Oakland’s team ERA in July has been 2.49, and the opponent’s OPS has dropped from a .648 June to a .609 this month. Pitching, of course, is the ultimate equalizer, and it was one of the main reasons why the Moneyball Athletics of the Aughts were able to win- they had Barry Zito, Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder, Ted Lilly, Rich Harden, Joe Blanton and Dan Haren at one point or another during the decade. Moneyball tactics handled the offense and to a certain degree the relief pitching, allowing the A’s to not squander all of that pitching in 2-1 losses.

Ironically, the current Athletics might turn out not to Moneyball enough offensively to take advantage of all of this pitching. They are second to last in OBP in the American League. The A’s are good at drawing walks- fourth in the AL- but their actual hitting is so atrocious that all of the walks in the world aren’t going to help them: they have a .228 team batting average. They are also scoring the fewest runs-per-game in the AL as well.

Therefore, I’m not optimistic about the future of the Athletics this season, but, hey, I wasn’t optimistic that Ben Sheets would make a comeback, so you never know. These are things to stay tuned to.