Players and Melvin excited for big crowd

A’s manager Bob Melvin expects the Coliseum to be lively Tuesday night.

To mark the 50th anniversary of their first game in Oakland, the A’s gave away tickets to Tuesday’s game against the White Sox. The team issued 200,000 tickets and expects roughly 70,000 fans to come to the Coliseum, based on RSVPs.

“It should be very exciting,” Melvin said. “As I’ve said often, when there’s 15,000 (fans) here it sounds like 30,000. I don’t know what the number’s going to be, but it’s going to feel like double that, probably. Hopefully, we can put on a good show for them and get them going.”

The A’s drew an average of about 21,700 for their seasonopening series against the Angels. But the following series against Texas drew a total of 34,613 fans over four games and included two games that drew fewer than 8,000.

“I really don’t know what to expect,” shortstop Marcus Semien said. “If it’s a packed crowd, which it sounds like it will be, it’ll be a little more energy, I think. We just want to play some good baseball here. We’ve had a slow start here, so we want to get it rolling at home.”

Semien, a Bay Area native, said he does hope the ticket promotion reached some fans who normally aren’t able to attend games in person.

“There may be a lot of people who have never had the opportunity to pay for a ticket here to watch us play, who get to watch us,” Semien said. “Hopefully that means some young kids in this community.”

An A’s spokesman said the Coliseum’s capacity is 56,782. Second baseman Jed Lowrie said a crowd that size would create “an environment that a lot of these young guys haven’t played in before.

“There should be a lot of people. I mean, I would expect that. You would hope so, right? If it’s not, that might be a bigger issue.”

Briefly: Melvin confirmed that right-hander Trevor Cahill will be called up to start Tuesday night’s game. Cahill, who signed a one-year deal in March, will make his first start for the A’s since 2011. Outfielder Trayce Thompson isa likely candidate to be sent out to make room for Cahill. … The A’s activated utilityman Chad Pinder (knee) from the 10-day disabled list before Monday’s game and optioned infielder Franklin Barreto to Triple-A Nashville.