The Oakland Athletics open up a three game series with the Arizona Diamondbacks hoping to stem the tide of their continuing struggles. Aside from their five-game winning streak against the Kansas City Royals and San Francisco Giants, the A's have managed to lose 19 of 22 games. During that stretch the A's have amazingly only dropped 5 1/2 games in the standings. After beating the Baltimore Orioles on May 29 to win their fourth straight game, the A's were sitting at .500 and were 1 1/2 games back of first place Texas. A month later the A's are ten games under .500 and sitting seven games out of first. Of course, the negative momentum they currently have makes that seven games seem like a lot more.
While the A's are taking on the Diamondbacks, the first place Rangers host the Florida Marlins for three games, the Los Angeles Angels will be hosting the Dodgers in their annual freeway series, and the Seattle Mariners host the San Diego Padres for three games. With the A's playing Seattle and Texas and LA and Seattle facing off later next weekend, this interleague weekend is sort of a pace weekend where nobody wants to lose ground heading into a big pre-All Star stretch.