Battle of the Bay: Oakland A's Defeat Giants in First 2011 Meeting

I admit that if the Athletics had lost this game, I would probably have fallen into the crowd that says "well this is just spring training and doesn't matter, we'll get them in the regular season." Thankfully, the A's took care of business (and the Giants) today behind a solid pitching performance and plenty of support from the lineup beating the World Champion Giants, 6-0.

In his three innings of work, Brett Anderson gave up only one hit and one walk while striking out five. Anderson was followed by a scoreless inning from Joey Devine, two scoreless innings from Fernando Cabrera, an inning from Gabe DeHoyas, and a combined inning from Fautino De Los Santos and Brad Ziegler. Ziegler returned to the mound to shut down the Giants in the ninth.

On the offensive side, the A's received contributions from Coco Crisp (1-3, two RBI), Daric Barton (1-3), Mark Ellis (1-3, one RBI), Eric Sogard (1-3) and Michael Choice (2-4).

The A's got the scoring started in the first inning when Mark Ellis singed on a fly ball to San Francisco center fielder Aaron Rowand, scoring Coco Crisp. Oakland pushed two more runs across in the fifth inning on a Coco Crisp single to right fielder Nate Shierholtz, scoring Landon Powell and Michael Choice.

In the seventh inning, the A's scored another run when Jai Miller scored as Josh Willingham reached base safely on an error by San Francisco left fielder Thomas Neal. Michael Taylor reached on another error by San Francisco in the seventh inning, scoring Josh Donadson to give Oakland a 6-0 lead.

Brett Anderson was credited with the win, improving to 1-1 in his spring appearances. Madison Bumgarner received the loss for the Giants, moving to 0-2, although he did not give up an earned run in his three innings of work.

The Giants allowed three unearned runs to the Athletics on four errors by Mark DeRosa, Miguel Tejada, Thomas Neal and Charlie Culbertson. Oakland had one error by left fielder Michael Choice.

Oakland	AB	R	H	RBI	BB	SO	LOB	AVG
Crisp, CF	3	1	1	2	0	0	0	.417
- Miller, Ja PR-LF	0	2	0	0	2	0	0	.500
Barton, 1B	3	0	1	0	0	0	2	.273
- Timmons PR-1B	2	0	0	0	0	0	2	.231
Ellis, 2B	3	0	1	1	0	0	2	.444
- Cardenas, 2B	1	0	0	0	0	0	1	.250
Willingham, DH	2	0	0	0	1	1	2	.364
- Donaldson, PH-DH	1	1	0	0	0	0	0	.300
LaRoche, 3B	1	0	0	0	2	0	0	.273
- Tolleson, PR-3B	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	.154
Taylor, RF	4	0	0	0	0	2	5	.167
Powell, C	2	1	0	0	2	0	0	.222
- Recker, PR-C	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.333
Choice, LF	4	1	2	0	0	1	3	.417
Sogard, SS	3	0	1	0	0	0	1	.364
- Horton, SS	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	.250
Total	30	6	6	3	8	4	18
Oakland	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	HR	ERA
Anderson, B (W, 1-1)	3.0	1	0	0	1	5	0	7.20
Devine (H, 2)	1.0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0.00
Cabrera, F (H, 1)	2.0	0	0	0	0	2	0	0.00
DeHoyos	1.0	2	0	0	0	0	0	0.00
De Los Santos	0.2	1	0	0	1	0	0	0.00
Ziegler	1.1	2	0	0	0	1	0	0.00

Brandon McClintock covers the Oakland Athletics and Major League Baseball for BleacherReport.com. You can follow him on Twitter:     @BMcClintock_BR.