Oakland Athletics (39-49) at Texas Rangers (47-41) Game 1 of 4 (7:05 pm CT)

The Texas Rangers will meet a team from their own division tonight as they host the Oakland Athletics for a four-game series. While they are from the same division, the Rangers lead the AL West by one game over the LA Angels while Oakland sits at the bottom of the division behind by eight games.

Right now, the Rangers are on a pretty good tear after performing a sweep at Arlington of the Baltimore Orioles. Their bats were virtually on fire. They just hit .414 over three games and had 19 extra base hits. Last night, their win over Baltimore was by eight runs.

As the Rangers face the A’s tonight, they will look to obtain a four-game winning streak at home. Here’s a look at the pitching matchups for tonight’s game and how the batters fare against the opposing pitcher.

Pitching Matchups

LHP Derek Holland starts for Texas. He is 6-4 with a 5.10 ERA. His performances this season have been up and down so it is hard to determine which pitcher we will see on the mound. Last time out against the Marlins, he didn’t even last a full inning allowing five earned runs and walking two. When he’s good though, he’s good. On June4, he pitched a complete game five-hit shutout and then only allowed three earned runs in 7.1 innings on June 20 against the Astros. He has the talent to succeed and currently hasn’t lost his starting position so he’ll look to give himself some leverage tonight with a strong start.

RHP Rich Harden will start for Oakland. He is 1-0 with a 3.00 ERA this season after making his season debut on July 1 against Arizona going six innings allowing two runs on four hits while walking none and striking out six. It was a solid performance for Harden who had just been activated from the 60-day disabled list.

Pitchers vs. Hitters

LHP Derek Holland: Hideki Matsui is 4-for-13 with two homers and five RBIs off Holland. Kurt Suzuki is 3-for-12 with two homers and four RBIs and Cliff Pennington 3-for-11 with one RBI. Scott Sizemore is 2-for-2 while Coco Crisp is 0-for-2.

RHP Rich Harden: Michael Young is 8-for-31 with one homer and three RBIs and Adrian Beltre is 2-for-13 with one homer and three RBIs. Josh Hamilton and Ian Kinsler are both 2-for-3 against Harden – both having an RBI. Mike Napoli is 1-for-5 and David Murphy is 1-for-2.