The Japan series is over and no longer do I have to wake up at 6am to catch my daily dose of baseball. I like the idea of having a few games in Japan, but I don’t like having the season opener completely disjointed from the “other” season opener that will take place this Sunday night. It’s kind of a tease. Which leads me to Rich Harden.

Oh Rich Harden, I took a chance on you in all my fantasy drafts last year, but completely forgot about you this year! Needless to say, it looks like this could have been a huge mistake on my part. You struck out 9 in 6 innings of work while only allowing 3 hits and 1 run. The last time you struck out 9 was all the way back in 2005. I pleaded with you last year to stay healthy and it didn’t work so I’ll try again: Please stay healthy this year so you can dazzle us with your pitching ability.

Keith Foulke who retired in 2007 due to health reasons, pitched an inning in both games and struck out 2 while allowing not a single run. He entered both games as the setup man and was used in a fairly high leverage situation (LI of 2.17) in the first game. So far so good for the 35 year old.

Emil Brown made a big base-running error in the first game costing the A’s .25 wins (only -.064 wins overall). He tried to remedy his error in the second game by leading all batters with a WPA of .12 wins, courtesy of his 3 run homer in the 3rd inning.

And finally, Manny Ramirez now leads everyone in WPA and has already eclipsed his 2007 WPA total of .31. Looks like he’s already started to rebound from his worst season ever.

And don’t forget to check out Studes’ latest “Ten Things” column over at The Hardball Times where he delves into the merits of WPA/LI among other things.