NOTE: Former A's manager Tony La Russa has retired.  Going out the way we all would want to: on top.

*** 

Butler grounded out (second to pitcher)

When Dennis Eckersley secured Tony Phillips' toss to first base, he did more than put the finishing touch on a thoroughly dominant sweep of the San Francisco Giants in the 1989 World Series.

He put an exclamation point on the first 22 years of baseball in Oakland.

Oakland.  The city that Gertrude Stein famously lamented had "no there there."  The city that Missouri senator Stuart Symington claimed was the "luckiest since Hiroshima" after Charlie Finley successfully orchestrated a move to the West Coast following the 1967 season.  The city that Finley tried to leave on several occasions.  The city that Al Davis did leave in 1981.

None of that mattered.  Oakland was now home to four World Series champions in 22 seasons- doubling its nearest competition during that same time span- and the A's were the envy of Major League baseball.

Life was good. 

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With Game One of the 2011 World Series just a few hours away, I present to you the A's fourteen appearances in the Fall Classic, including the Philadelphia years.  Instead of chronological order, we’ll get the five losses out of the way first, then wrap it up on a warm and gooey note.

Because I’m all about happy endings.

  

World Series tickets stubs from the 70's and 80's.

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As we prepare for a 20th consecutive World Series without the Green and Gold (sigh), you can take comfort that both managers of this year’s finalists bring an Oakland flavor to the party.  For many of you, that’s probably no consolation at all.

 

Ron Washington, the A’s former third-base coach- and one of the guys passed up in favor of Bob Geren- leads his Texas Rangers to the Big Dance for a second straight season.  The last manager to do so with an American League team was Joe Torre (1998-2001).

 

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My dad called me on the phone Saturday morning.

 

I can count on one hand the times my dad has called me on the phone.  Ever.  Strangely enough, it’s happened twice in the past week.  Last Tuesday he called to offer me his ticket to the next Raider home game.

 

The second call this week was to ask me if I had heard The News.  The one about the passing of "Big Al."  I told him I had. (Mom had beaten him by 20 minutes.)

 

(Now before you start to think this post is about the man that "destroyed" the Oakland Coliseum for eternity - most notably with the erection of the mountainous eyesore that bears his name - well, relax. It is not.)

 

Dad couldn’t get through on his first few attempts.  That’s because my phone was blowing up.  My oldest brother Ernie texted "Can’t believe how much loss I feel."

 

How, indeed.

 

Little did Al Davis know that a post was already in the works on why sports matter so much to us.

 

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Ah, the playoffs.  While I might not share baseballgirl’s volcanic lust for this time of year, we could do a whole lot worse than a few more weeks of baseball.  Even the A’s-less kind.

 

If the regular season is the school year, then the playoffs are prom, with the eight prettiest girls in the class vying for the right to wear that funny-looking thing on their head for the next twelve months.

 

Like most popularity contests, it is a flawed system. Take last year for example. How on earth did she win?

 

Once upon a time there was a young lady from Oakland. She was a nerd behind the computer that no one paid any mind to, except to poke fun at her shoes and her run-down surroundings. But year after year her invite to the pageant would show up in the mail.

 

Apparently as a cruel joke.

 

The uppity East Coast girls who pretended to be her friend and let her sit at the cool table were just using her to do their homework.  And she was more than happy to oblige.  After a while, they simply stopped inviting her.  She never understood why.

 

What worked for Disney never worked in Oakland.  The clock always struck midnight.  The slipper never fit.  Prince Charming slept with the ugly step-sisters. And just when our innocent one felt as if she belonged, they’d send her bawling from the Ball: "Back to the dungeon with those singing mice!"

 

I hate singing mice.

 

There’s your recent A’s history, with a twist.  You’re a loser, Dad.  You’re a loser, Dad.  You’re such a loser, Dad…

 

I, for one, wouldn’t mind some fresh faces at this dance.  In the American League, all four teams have been to the World Series as recently as 2006 (although only the Yankees- surprise!- emerged victorious), while three of this year’s National League finalists have been crowned World Champions within the last ten years.

 

Today’s slate calls for a double dip, junior circuit-style: the Texas Rangers at the Tampa Bay Rays (2:07PM), and the New York Yankees at the Detroit Tigers (5:37PM). Both times PST. You’re giddy, I can tell.

 

May the best home teams win.

There isn't a whole lot that the casual fan knows about Ray Fosse; save for the time Pete Rose invaded his personal space at an exhibition game in 1970.  Oh, and apparently he enjoys Dibs ice cream.

My memories of Fosse's career run a bit deeper than that, having watched him contribute to two World Series-winning ball clubs in Oakland.  Those first-hand experiences came in handy during my conversation with the former catcher last Sunday, as part of Comcast's Xfinity Couch campaign.

Ray Fosse would have fit right in with the A's of recent years.  That is, he was oft-injured.  The infamous collision with Pete Rose left him with a separated right shoulder, a prelude to a long list of ailments Fosse would endure throughout his 12-year playing career.  Still, he earned two All-Star selections and as many Gold Gloves during the 1970-71 seasons, all while playing in the purgatory that was Cleveland, where the Indians averaged nearly 89 losses in Fosse's first six years in the Majors.

Meanwhile over in Oakland, the mustachioed A's had disposed of the Establishment's darlings, the Cincinnati Reds, in a tightly-contested 1972 World Series that saw six of the seven games decided by a single run.  But as was often the case on ship captained by Charles Oscar Finley, there were grumblings on deck.  One of the more vocal among the disgruntled was catcher Dave Duncan who lamented over lost playing time.

Two weeks before they were to begin their title defense, the A's traded Duncan and outfielder George Hendrick to Cleveland for utility man Jack Heidemann and Ray Fosse.  Heidemann played exactly zero innings in an A's uniform, while Fosse found himself in the middle of the kind of dog-piles that occur when your team wins the World Series, which the A's did in each of the catcher's first two seasons with the club.

His days with the A's were among many of the topics we touched on.

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Those famous words, of course, were spouted from the mouth of Casey Stengel, a frustration-filled question directed at his 1962 New York Mets, who stumbled to a modern league-record 120 losses in their inaugural season.  (Enjoy more Stengelese below, all passages from "The Quotable Baseball Fanatic".)

 

You have to wonder if Bob Melvin is starting to think the same of this year’s Athletics. He had this to say after Saturday’s stinkfest:

 

"It’s demoralizing and it’s embarrassing. I don’t know what else to say," Melvin said. "There’s nothing more embarrassing than playing bad defense. You cannot pitch on days, you cannot hit on days but you should bring your glove every day. It’s inexcusable."

 

"What'd we have, four errors? Really, we played worse than that."

 

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Earlier this season, when many AN'ers were calling for the head of Bob Geren, there arose differing opinions (to put it nicely) on a manager's true worth to a team.

 In the case of Dick Williams, who died yesterday from a ruptured aortic aneurysm, there is little doubt what he meant to an up-and-coming Oakland A's club in the early 1970's.  Just ask his superstar right-fielder:

"He came to us at a very good time in our development and certainly for me as a young player full of talent ...We were young and needed to understand how to go about winning and take the final step to become a great team," Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson said. "He was very important in that. He demanded excellence."

Williams comes from a long line of former Kansas City A's players who found much more success filling out a lineup sheet than swinging a bat.

His first shot as a manager came in 1967 when he took the Red Sox- sixth-place finishers the season before- to within one win of being crowned champions of baseball.  As it was, his club's magical ride to the American League pennant helped long-suffering fans in Boston to realize an "Impossible Dream".

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I was almost nine years old when Charlie Finley traded Reggie Jackson to Baltimore on April 2, 1976, exactly 26 years before Mark Ellis put on an Oakland A's uniform for the first time.

I sat on my mom's bed on the last day of that '76 season listening to my sister's transistor radio while former World Series stars- Bando, Rudi, Campaneris, Fingers, and Tenace- said goodbye to Oakland; their foray into free agency officially closed the curtain on one of baseball's greatest dynasties.

I remember my younger sister Tricia practically shrieking when our brother Abel bolted into the kitchen with the news that Tony Armas had been traded to Boston following the 1982 season.

I can recall the sickening sense of déjà vu I felt when it was announced that the A's had dealt Rickey Henderson to the New York Yankees.

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The A's have swept two opponents this year, and they happen to wear the same colors (Orioles, Giants).  Can we order some orange and black for the Mets and Phillies, too?

I will be joining a few AN'ers in Philadelphia this weekend, and this caged bird is pretty damn giddy about it.  Which reminds me, hey Bloomie, you have my back again this Sunday?

Jack (McKeon) is back in Florida, and at the ripe old age of 80, he becomes the second-oldest manager in big-league history.  Connie Mack was 87 years old in his final season with the Philadelphia Athletics.  I don't know about you, but I wouldn't feel right about giving a guy that age the heave-ho if I were an umpire. 

McKeon managed the A's for parts of the 1977-78 seasons, getting fired by Charlie Finley in '77 and re-hired in '78 to replace the same guy (Bobby Winkles) who replaced him.  Then fired again.

See, we're not the only fanbase to use injuries as an excuse whose team is beset my by injuries:

The offense is this bad is because the lineup doesn’t have good hitters. Please cite this statistical study if you plan to reference it. It’s only fair. This team has been brutalized by injuries, by the loss of someone who hit like Juan Uribe (admittedly, keeping Uribe wouldn’t have helped, either), by the complete disintegration of Aubrey Huff, and by injuries. Also, injuries. That’s not fun, and you can’t even blame Sabean like you used to.

Aww.

Also, Gold Alts.

Proceed with dumping or whatever you all do on DLD's these days.

I don't care who you are. If that closing scene of "Field of Dreams" doesn't tug at your heartstrings, you might want to check for a pulse.

Since before forever ago, fathers and sons engaging in a game of ball-smacking-leather has been as much a part of the romance that is baseball as a freshly cut lawn or a mustard-stained shirt.  Ours is a sport passed down from one generation to the next, be it a father showing his son how to properly throw a knuckler or explaining the infield-fly rule to him under a spectacularly sunny sky.

There have been many stories right here on Athletics Nation of "my first game with Dad."  Some of their fathers are no longer with them, including those who have lost their dads in the last year.  But the memories endure.

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Well the boost of energy that many A's fans were hoping for with a new face in the dugout has yet to transpire.  And many of the things that plagued the team in the pre-Melvin era- anemic offense, sloppy glovework, and yes, questionable handling of the pitching staff by the manager- were evident this afternoon, a 5-3 loss to the White Sox that marked the A's 12^th defeat in 13 games.

First, the offense, which through the first six innings can be summed up in two words:  Coco Crisp.  The A's leadoff hitter started things off in the first with a single- the 1000^th knock of his career- stole second base, took third on a single by Cliff Pennington, and scored on Hideki Matsui's sacrifice fly.

The A's would go in order the next four innings before Crisp led off the sixth with a double, and eventually scored on a groundout by Ryan Sweeney.

Meanwhile the three runs scored by the White Sox up to that point came courtesy of a monster homerun by Adam Dunn in the fourth.  Other teams have guys that can alter games with one swing.  The A's have to work for everything they get.

For the most part, anyway.  Not so in the seventh inning when Scott Sizemore jumped on a hanging breaking ball to tie the game at three with a solo homerun.  Alas, the A's new third baseman gave it right back in the bottom half.  Starter Guillermo Moscoso sandwiched a pair of walks around a pop-out, thus ending his day after facing one batter two many, and Grant Balfour came on to induce a grounder to third off the bat of Carlos Quentin.  Rather than get the sure out at first, Sizemore opted for second instead and threw wide of the bag past a diving Jemile Weeks, allowing Mark Teahen to trot home with lead run.  Paul Konerko hit the very next pitch into left field for an RBI-single that proved to be the winning run.

The A's closed within 5-4 in the ninth but the teA'se ended on bang-bang play with Coco Crisp being called out at first base.  In Oakland, even when you're safe, you're out.  It was a fitting end to a tumultuous road trip, in which the A's won only once in ten tries, made a managerial move, and lost another starting pitcher to injury.  Tomorrow's day off cannot come soon enough.

Victories, these days, come in baby steps for our Oakland Athletics, and a win this afternoon will give Bob Melvin's club a split of this four-game set with the White Sox, which sounds a whole lot better than the clean sweep the A's have endured in their previous three series' against New York, Boston, and Baltimore.

The A's official site points out that Landon Powell will make a rare start- his first since June 4- behind the plate today, giving first-string backstop Kurt Suzuki a well-deserved rest. Suzuki has appeared on 27 of the team's last 29 games. The new skipper explains:

"Kurt wants to play every day," Melvin said. "He's able to do it, but you also want to keep him fresh. I think, even as a regular behind the plate, when you're playing that much, you don't even understand the toll it takes on you. I want everyone to be part of it. We need to get [Powell] involved. He does a nice job behind the plate."

Oakland sends Guillermo Moscoso to the mound today; Chicago counters with Philip Humber, who bested the A's on May 13.

Lineups after the jump.

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Well, let’s face it, when your starting pitcher’s line looks this:

 

IP	H	R	ER	BB	K	HR
2.2	8	6	6	3	1	1

 

 

…you’re not going to win too many ballgames.

 

Unfortunately for the A’s those numbers belonged to Trevor Cahill, and they added up to a tenth consecutive defeat, tied for the team’s fourth-longest losing skid since they landed in Oakland in 1968.

 

You could say that Cahill was a victim of carefully placed hits by the Chicago White Sox tonight, and you’d be right.  Of course, bases-loaded walks in the second and third innings certainly did not help his cause.  Too many of those will make you sleep on your side of the bed.

 

As has been the case far too often lately, most of the attention centered not on the diamond, but in the dugout.  And it was quite the inauspicious beginning for Bob Melvin, who must be wondering what he has gotten himself into.

 

When it looked as if the A’s might make a game of it, thanks to a 2-run homer off the bat of Hideki Matsui in the seventh, the Sox put up their third 3-spot of the night in the eighth, making the last inning nothing more than a formality.

 

Everyone in Chicago’s starting lineup got at least one hit, the big blows courtesy of their big boppers, Adam Dunn and Paul Konerko, both of whom went deep with a man on base.  Those runs alone were nearly enough to make a winner out of Mark Buehrle who scattered seven hits in as many innings.

 

Maybe a rain-out won’t be such a bad thing.

 

A's down 6-1 after four innings. Different leading actor, same movie. Wanna know how it ends?  Hey, at least you can walk out on this mess if you want.

I don't think I need to get too carried away with an intro.  The Bob Melvin era is upon us.  No one knows what that means yet, but here's to a fresh start.

Trevor Cahill and Mark Buehrle take the ball for their team, and these are the lineups they will face tonight:

A's

1. Coco Crisp (S) CF

2. Cliff Pennington (S) SS

3. Conor Jackson (R) 1B

4. Josh Willingham (R) LF

5. Kurt Suzuki (R) C

6. Hideki Matsui (L) DH

7. Adam Rosales (R) 3B

8. David DeJesus (L) RF

9. Jemile Weeks (S) 2B

White Sox 

1. Juan Pierre (L) LF 2. Alexei Ramirez (R) SS 3. Carlos Quentin (R) RF 4. Paul Konerko (R) 1B 5. A.J. Pierzynski (L) C 6. Alex Rios (R) CF 7. Adam Dunn (L) DH 8. Omar Vizquel (S) 3B 9. Gordon Beckham (R) 2B

#Athletics announce today that Bob Geren has been relieved of his duties and ex-MLB manager Bob Melvin has been named interim manager.

Link

Also, the new guy's resume.

How far have the A's fallen?  An O's fan rejoices, sort of:

Wow, Not Sucking rocks, y'know? Seriously! ‘Course, not sucking against the A's recently doesn't exactly have the virtue of exclusivity. But hey, who's counting THEIR losses?

Well, Titov, we're counting them.  After all, the A's are skinny-dipping ever so closely into uncharted waters.  The nine-game losing streak is their sixth-longest skid since moving to Oakland the year after I was born, but it's not the worst in the Bob Geren era.  The 2008 A's lost ten straight from July 28 to August 7, a mark that this current bunch can tie tonight. A sweep in Chicago will put the streak at a dozen games, which would surpass the 1978 A's (11 games, June 8-18) and equal the second-worst mark set in 1994 (April 19-30), and reached again when the A's lost their last nine games in 1995, and dropped their first three contests the following season.

Still a little ways off is the all-time Oakland record for consecutive defeats (14), set in 1977 (July 29-August 1977), and well beyond that is the franchise mark of 20 straight losses, accomplished twice by the Philadelphia Athletics (1916 and 1943).  The 1916 squad set the standard for suck: their .235 winning percentage (36-117) is the worst in the modern era (post-1901).

And we can't leave out the Kansas City A's, no foreigner to poor performance.  During their 13-year stay in the Midwest- in which they failed to record even one winning season- the Athletics had five losing streaks of nine games or more, including a 13-game stretch of futility in 1959.

It should be noted that no A's manager lost their job during or immediately following any of the aforementioned streaks, although Tony La Russa moved to St. Louis at the end of the 1995 season, leaving Art Howe to pick up the tab on that 12-game slide.

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A homerun by the wrong lead-off guy has the wrong team in front. 1-0 Baltimore after four.

As danbot continues his journey along the yellow brick road in search of a heart- hey! just like the A's!- I will be your host for this afternoon. Admittedly, I will have to rely on Ken Korach for today's action, while I multi-task through the game threads.  Old hat.

Further proof that A's management reads our little ol' site: the lineup is a-shakin'.  And right there on top, making his big-league debut, is none other than Jemilie Weeks. Woot!

There's a spill on aisle 7, and the A's send Guillermo Moscoso to clean up the mess.  He will opposed by Chris Jakubauskas.  Overall, our guy has theirs beat by a syllable; let's hope he's at least one (less) run better on the bump.

And now for your viewing pleasure, the lineups:

1. J.J. Hardy (R) SS 2. Nick Markakis (L) RF 3. Adam Jones (R) CF 4. Vladimir Guerrero (R) DH 5. Derrek Lee (R) 1B 6. Matt Wieters (S) C 7. Luke Scott (L) LF 8. Mark Reynolds (R) 3B 9. Ryan Adams (R) 2B

1. Jemile Weeks (S) 2B 2. Daric Barton (L) 1B 3. David DeJesus (L) RF 4. Josh Willingham (R) LF 5. Ryan Sweeney (L) CF 6. Kurt Suzuki (R) C 7. Hideki Matsui (L) DH 8. Scott Sizemore (R) 3B 9. Cliff Pennington (S) SS