Remember back earlier this month when Texas Rangers shortstop Elvis Andrus said something along the lines of the Rangers really wanting to play spoiler to other teams down the stretch when it became abundantly clear the Rangers were not going to playing October baseball this year?
Well, they started doing just that over the weekend with their improbable sweep of the visiting Atlanta Braves — the Rangers' first three-game sweep since April.
That sweep, of course, came on the road in Oakland's O.co Coliseum against the A's, where the Rangers will begin a three-game road series against those same A's on Tuesday night.
The A's are 11-22 since Aug. 9, which makes them baseball's worst team since that date. They currently sit just one game up on Kansas City for the top AL Wild Card spot and three games up on Seattle for the final playoff spot in the American League.
So the Rangers have a big opportunity this week. The Mariners are playing the first-place Angels, so they might not win anyway, but if they do, and the Rangers can take some games from the A's, they'll move the A's closer to the brink of an October-free season, something that was not even being considered a month ago.
Of course, after they play the A's, they travel to Anaheim to play the Angels and then return home for another four-game series with Oakland to close out the season. The Rangers have nothing to play for but pride, and the opportunity to stick a fork in someone else.
