With the A’s starting a lefty, Jacoby Ellsbury found himself on the bench Tuesday night against Eric Surkamp. He may have to get used to it in the coming weeks with more lefthanders on the horizon.
Brett Gardner was benched in the season’s first game against Astros lefty Dallas Keuchel — Aaron Hicks got the start — but Gardner is off to a fast start, posting a .314/.442/.429 (batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage) slash line entering the game. Ellsbury (.213/.260/.298), is not.
“We’re going to see a lot of lefties in the next nine, 10 days,’’ Joe Girardi said, “so Hicksie’s probably going to get a lot of at-bats because he’s been so good against lefthanders in his career.