I wanted to tie a bow to wrap up three stories I had written about earlier this month:

With their 7-2 win over Boston this afternoon (and the day off tomorrow), the Oakland A's have completed their August games with a 21-6 record (game-by-game log). As I discussed originally in my August 8 posting, the A's have shown an amazing tendency to get hot in August, going back several years. From 2001-2006 inclusive, Oakland's record for games in August is 124-45 (.734)...

A couple of Sundays ago (August 20), I wrote about the Seattle Mariners' record 20-game losing streak within their own division, the American League West. In the time since, the M's have really turned things around (log). After August 20, Seattle went outside of the AL West, winning five out of six games (combined) against the AL East's New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox. These wins, of course, did nothing to end the Mariners' AL West losing streak, but seemed to suggest Seattle had righted the ship. The Mariners then returned to AL West play a couple nights ago, shutting out the Angels 2-0. And tonight, the M's go for a three-game sweep over the Halos...

The Houston Astros' Willy Taveras, about whom I wrote in the posting immediately below the current one, had his consecutive games hitting steak end at 30 on Tuesday night.