A few points about these three players...

1) Last year the Blue Jays signed Shannon Stewart to a minor league contract and invited him to Spring training. He made the club and yet the A's did not get a compinsation pick (he was a B). Why not just sign a Cabrera to a minor league deal with a 5 million signing bonus and roster bonus of $ 200,000 every month he is the majors? MLB might not be pleased, but Beane can just point to the year before.

2) I am not sure about getting ride of Crosby. He public enemy number one today, but why? Sure he was far from great last year. Is it expectation? Peter Gammons said he will be MVP once.  He should be this or that and he is not. I say maybe he is miss used.

3) Last year Crosby batted second in the order 142 times, fifth 84 times, sixth 162 times and seventh 85 times. He batted ninth one time! In theory, the lineup next year will have a Holliday, Giambi and Chavez all batting 600 times each. If Crosby is batting 600 times in the ninth spot, the A's would be fine. 450 AB's by Crosby in the 2,5,6 or 7 hole and the A's are not good.

 

With the A's picking up all these new players and with maybe more to come I was wondering what will happen at rule 5 time. Are the A's going to lose two or three prospects that they just traded for?

It is my understanding that players drafted out of College get 4 years before they must be protected and High School players get 5 year.  This might bring up an interesting point when thinking of which players will be called up in September. We might not see a Cahill, Anderson, Simmons or Doolittle this year, because that would save them from the 40 man list.

I believe Pennington, Recker, Cunningham, Gio, Patterson and Outman might need to be added to the 40 man by this November. Not sure if I am doing the math right.

There does seem to be a few guys that would easily come off the 40 man to make room (Foulke, Brown, DiNardo, Gray, Thomas).

I was just wondering if anyone had done the numbers and figured out who must be added and who is likely lost.  If a Street is traded for three players, are they all keepers. And for that matter is next years list going to be worse?

This may not be a big deal, but I bet Beane looks at these dates.

Thanks

 

 

 

 

 

Baseball America's Proscppect Hanbook is out with it's 30 top A's proscects.  It is interesting in that it went to press before the trades of Swisher, Haren and Kotsay.

1. Daric Barton (last years ranking 2)

2. Trevor Cahill (9)

3. James Simmons

4. Henry Rodriguez

5. Andrew Bailey(28)

6. Corey Brown

7. Landon Powell(20)

8. Jermaine Mitchell (5)

9. Javier Herrera(6)

10. Sean Doolittle

11. Jerry Blevins (Cub)

12. Grant Desme

13. Gregorio Petit

14. Justin Sellers(9)

15. Richie Robnett (11)

16. Matt Sulentic(4)

17. Kevin Melillo(13)

18. Vin Mazzaro (18)

19. Sam Demel

20. Dan Meyer

21. Jeff Baisley (21)

22. Andrew Carignan

23. Brad Kilby

24. Cliff Pennington (12)

25. Travis Banwart

26. Josh Horton

27. Anthony Recker (23)

28. Graham Godfrey (Blue Jay)

29. Fernando Hernandez (White sox)

30. Craig Italiano(22)

Players cut from last years list....Windsor (7), Komine(14), Lansford(15), Putnam(16), Lislie(17), Mitchell(24), Ray(25), Webb(26), Lee(29) and Cobb(30) 

 

With Beane starting to clean house with the A's, and looking to 2009 and beyond. There is a different idea than just trading Street for one or two more prospects. How about signing Street to a long term deal, but weight the money on the early years, thus the A's closer will be cheap two years from today.

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Shannon Stewart and Mike Piazza declined arbitraton last night. With the old rules in baseball the A's could not resign either player until May 1st, but I belive that rule is no longer in effect. Not that the A's are likely to resign either.

We were all probable holding are breath and praying that Piazza would not accect. A's could only cut Piazza's pay by 20%.

So here is hopeing that both Stewart and Piazza continue their baseball playing with another team. Two Compinsation picks no worse than 48 and 49 would be a nice add to a draft with picks 12 and some pick around 60.

Thought it would help to put out what Baseball America thought of the A's minor league and their top 30 prospects.

1. Travis Buck (last year rating 5)
   
2. Daric Barton (1)
   
3. Kurt Suzuki (11)
   
4. Matt Sulentic (2006 pick 3)
   
5. Jermaine Mitchell (2006 pick 5)
   
6. Javier Herrera ((2)
   
7. Jason Windsor (15)
   
8. Marcus McBeth
   
9. Justin Sellers (17)
   
10. Trevor Cahill (2006 pick 2)
    
11. Richie Robnett (13)
    
12. Cliff Pennington (3)
    
13. Mevin Melillo (6)
    
14. Shane Komine (9)
    
15. Jared Lansford (12)
    
16. Danny Putnam (14)
    
17. Myron Leslie
    
18. Vin Mazzaro (10)
    
19. Ryan Goleski (Clev. not top 30)
    
20. Landon Powell (20)
    
21. Jeff Baisley (30)
    
22. Craig Italano (8)
    
23. Anthony Recker
    
24. Mike Mitchell
    
25. Jason Ray (22
    
26. Ryan Webb
    
27. Ben Jukich (2006 pick 13)
    
28. Andrew Bailey (2006 pick 6)
    
29. Chad Lee (2006 pick 7)
    
30. Larry Cobb (2006 pick 27)

Not on list from last year
Andre Ethier (4) traded
Jairo Garcia (7)
Gregorio Petit (16)
Jimmy Shull (18)
Dallas Braden (19)
Dan Meyer (21)
Brant Colamarino (23)
Connor Robertson (24)
Brian Stavisky (25)
Freddie Byrun (26) traded
John Rheinecker (27) traded
Mike Madsen (28)
Ramon Alvarado (29)

David Shafer was 20th in Cinn after being 26th last year.

Hope you enyoy

Just got the Baseball America Prospect Handbook yesterday and as always it is a good read. They ranked the A's lower than most years, in that they lost great prospects to the big team (Street, Swisher...). Here is there 30 A's prospcts.

1. Barton
   
2. Herrera
   
3. Pennington
   
4. Ethier
   
5. Buck
   
6. Melillo
   
7. Garcia
   
8. Italiano
   
9. Komine
   
10. Mazzaro
    
11. Suzuki
    
12. Lansford
    
13. Robnett
    
14. Putnam
    
15. Windsor
    
16. Petit
    
17. Sellers
    
18. Shull
    
19. Braden
    
20. Powell
    
21. Meyer
    
22. Ray
    
23. Colamarino
    
24. Robertson
    
25. Stavisky
    
26. Bynum
    
27. Rheinecker
    
28. Madsen
    
29. Alvarado
    
30. Baisley

The trade is a few days old an all of Athletics Nation has been putting their 2 cents in on both the Payton and Byrnes deals. My big question is what is the money or cash that the Sox are sending to the A's? I have looked and not seen any listing. The A's I read sent 50 K to the Rockies.

With Payton getting around 3.7 million this year and having a .5 million buy out, the A's are on the hook for about 2.2 million and were able to ship off Bradford and the .6 million he had left. Taking on an additional 1.5 or so million to get Payton seem like something Beane would not do for a part time outfielder.

The Yanks got Leiter and it cost them only 400 K for the rest of the year. Florida threw in 2+ million to get a PTBN.

Money is what grades this deal and until we have the numbers it is hard for me to give a thumbs up or down.

If any one has the cash amount please ...bring it on.

Baseball America has put out it book on the game's top prospects as ranked by them. Here is the A's list.

1. Swisher (last year #6)
   
2. Barton
   
3. Herrera (last year #28)
   
4. Meyer
   
5. Blanton (last year #2)
   
6. Johnson, Dan (#3)
   
7. Street
   
8. Garcia
   
9. Robnett
   
10. Quintanilla (#7)
    
11. Suzuki
    
12. Powell
    
13. Putnam
    
14. Baker (#18)
    
15. Snyder (#25)
    
16. Ethier (#9)
    
17. Windsor
    
18. Knox
    
19. Johnson, Tyler
    
20. Ogando
    
21. Rheinecker (#13)
    
22. Yabu
    
23. Melillo
    
24. Sullivan (#4)
    
25. Bynum (#16)
    
26. Perry
    
27. Petit
    
28. Colamarino
    
29. Rouse (#8)
    
30. Webb

Gone from the list from last year but still with in the A's minors is Brown (#14), Fritz (#17), McCurdy (#19) Kiger (#24), Ramos (#26) McBeth (#27) and Majewski (#29)

I am not sure this has been brought to light. The A's GM in the late 80's and early 90's was Sandy Alderson. If as Tony LaRussa says, he knew that Canseco was using steriods, then it is very likely that his boss, Sandy, knew.

So we jump to today and Sandy Alderson is the #2 guy in the MLB league office and he deals with fines and that kind of stuff. He has been there for a good five years. In fact he might have left the A's to take the job at MLB.

So this new bit of news in the NY Post (I think it was the post)about the FBI coming to MLB and saying you got a problem back 10 years ago is interesting in that Sandy is the one downplaying it. I read an artical that Sandy said that it was a low key statement by an FBI agent to a MLB offcal that was never followed up. Then a few years later there was another FBI call and again it was not followed up.

It seems to me Sandy Alderson has not pushing this issue that he has lived with for 15 years. Sandy made Canseco the highest payed player in baseball back in the mid 90's when he knew that Canseco was on the stuff. And today he is the one who is going to run the clean up?