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New York Yankees (25-22) at Oakland Athletics (17-32), 10:05 p.m. (ET)

(SportsNetwork.com) - CC Sabathia tries to bounce back from one of the worst outings of his career on Thursday when the New York Yankees open a four-game series with the Oakland Athletics at the Coliseum.

Sabathia's home woes continued on Saturday against Texas, as he was pounded for six runs and seven hits in just 2 1/3 innings, dropping him to 2-6 on the season to go along with a 5.47 ERA.

"Just to have the ball up is frustrating," Sabathia said. "It's something that I need to correct, get the two-seamers down and get a ground ball to get a double play and get out of that inning."

It was Sabathia's shortest start since June 21, 2009, at Miami, when he left after 1 1/3 innings with left biceps tendinitis, and his shortest non-injury start since June 21, 2006, for the Indians at Wrigley Field.

Sabathia has lost all three of his home starts this season and has pitched to an 11.77 ERA in the Bronx, where he has lost his last six starts. However, he is 2-3 away from home with a 3.48 ERA.

"When you think about Yankee Stadium, you think it favors left-handers over right-handers, so it's really hard to put your finger on it," Yankees manager Joe Girardi said after Saturday's setback. "I don't really think there's anything to it, it's just, it's happened. He had a tough start today and he needs to bounce back."

In 27 starts against the A's he is 8-10 with a 4.66 ERA.

New York heads into this seven-game road trip, which also includes a stop in Seattle, rolling after a three-game sweep of the Kansas City Royals that saw the Yankees outscore the defending American League champs by a 23-5 margin.

Oakland, meanwhile, followed up a season-best three-game winning streak by losing the final two legs of its three-game set with the Detroit Tigers, including a 3-2 setback in Wednesday's rubber match.

Not only did the A's lose for the sixth time in nine games overall, but it may have lost Scott Kazmir for the forseeable future, as the lefty exited with a shoulder injury after the third inning.

Heading to the hill for the A's on Thursday will be righty Kendall Graveman, who was tremendous in a win over Tampa Bay on Saturday. Following a four-week stay at Triple-A, Graveman scattered three hits over six scoreless innings to improve to 2-2, while lowering his ERA to 6.04.

Graveman had won a rotation spot out of spring training by pitching to a 0.36 ERA, but was awful in four starts for the A's before being sent to Nashville, where he was 2-1 with a 1.85 ERA.

"I think those last three starts in Nashville, it kind of got back to where I wanted it to," Graveman said. "To improve on that and build upon what I did in Nashville was good, so I think it's back. In spring, I was getting a lot of ground balls, and today I got a lot of ground balls also."

Oakland took four of six from the Yankees last season.

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