We've written before about our love of soccer but unfortunately, being here in the States, it's a little hard to get the full flavor of it. Major League Soccer isn't quite that exciting and there's no longer a franchise here. There are also plenty of places in the city to watch some Premiere League (and occasional Serie A games) but it's not quite the same as watching the games in Europe. Also, we don't like to get up early. So we're kind of excited over the news that Stanford is going to host a game between the Premiere League's Chelsea and Mexico's Club America on July 14th....

This afternoon beneath overcast skies at McAfee Coliseum, the 2006 Oakland Athletics continued to defy expectations by smacking the Minnesota Twins 8-3 in a fashion befitting a potential World Series team. The entire game was a literal composite of the A’s season: solid pitching, timely defense and amazing clutch hitting. ...

The Oakland Athletics this afternoon showed why this year’s team is infinitely grittier and more determined than playoff teams of years past. This collection of misfits and guys barely above the legal drinking age simply know how to win. They’ve outplayed and out-executed the Twins in the Metroblob, and showed the baseball world why they’ll go deep into the playoffs. Instead of Frank Thomas hammering the Twins into submission this afternoon, it was the likes of Nick Swisher, Marco Scutaro and Mark Kotsay running the Twins ragged. The 5-2 final score doesn’t reflect the way the A’s controlled this game. Boof Bonser, the Twins starting pitcher, never really had a chance against the highly selective, pitch-conscious A’s batters. They nitpicked the poor guy like vultures picking at an animal carcass. And in the end it came down to the basics: hitting, pitching, defense and the big play (something the Twins were touted as superior to the A’s). Esteban Loiaza, a man we’ve called out in the past, pitched like he’s been sipping on stud juice—he was simply outstanding before running into a couple of homerun blasts. It was also Swisher making adjustments and not swinging for the fences, but using that crappy dome for less glamorous doubles. Smart move, Swish! And it was Mark Kotsay’s brilliant inside-the-park homerun that sealed the deal on this little affair in Minneapolis. ...

Oakland finally snapped out of it and beat the Mariners 12-3 just as word filtered down the Angels lost 5-2. Your Magic Number? 0. As in "clinched." As in "playoffs!" ...

Sunday night in the Bronx, the New York Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox, 9-2. As everyone knows, that means the Yankees will win the 2005 World Series. Even so, the other teams in Major League baseball will play 162 games this year. That includes your Oakland Athletics, now Lewis Wolff's and Billy Beane's Oakland Athletics as well. (Try to share.) At 12:05 PM SFist Jake, contributing.......