In a game we absolutely need to win, the Bears have decided to make Chris Harris inactive. Wow. Unless he's about to be traded and they don't want to risk an injury, this is crazy. If he's still not 100% due to the hamstring, they should have just said that. Look, I get the fact that we needed a shake-up. I get that he didn't play well last week (I think most of that was due to rust/not being 100%). But, this move is just throwing one of our leaders completely under the bus. It stinks...unless, again, he's going to be traded, or he's not one of our 4 best options at safety due to his injury (which seems highly unlikely - if true, why not just say he's hurt?).  Yet another CRAZY move from our team. if we don't make the playoffs this year, there is no reason to not clean shop. Angelo, Lovie, EVERYONE has failed, in what should have been a definite playoff year, especially with all that cap space.

In this Slusser article, there's a short mention that the A's have decided to move Grant Green to CF. Obviously, Green was not doing great defensively at SS, but is there reason to think he can be a decent defensive CFer? It's not like CF is an easy position to play, either. Though maybe it will let him use his athletic ability a little better? For those who have watched him play, do you think he has the range and arm and IQ (as in, do you think he can learn how to run efficiently out there a la Kotsay, or be an athletic mess like Byrnes) to cut it? He had a good bat for a SS, and he'll have a good one for a CFer, provided he keeps improving, so I'm not that concerned about that. Will this speed up his development? 

Looks like Brown signed with the champs. 2 years, $6m. A reasonable price...one that I kind of hoped we could bring him back at. Oh well. Kind of the price range I figured. I think the team is really convinced Izzy and Anderson give us close to Brown's production, which I don't necessarily disagree with. Brown was solid, but that's it. Anyway, good luck to Alex. He always came to work, and was a great team leader.

It seems pretty certain that Alex Brown is going to be released, maybe today. Given his salary, nobody wanted to trade for him. I still think he's a solid DE, and I suspect the organization does, too, but not at the cost of $5m/year. He's not that good. But, here's a question. If nobody offers him that much money (it could happen, but I am skeptical), do you all think there's any chance we can resign him at a lower price tag? I think he's still a good player, and definitely worth having for $2-3m per year. I just don't see him getting much more than that right now. At that price, we should sign him back. Maybe that's against the rules...but I don't think it is.

Looks like the Texans aren't going to franchise DB Dunta Robinson. This is a no-brainer. We have cap space, we need help in the secondary (and front line - looks like we're targeting Peppers, whatever that means). Robinson is a top CB. We can line him and Peanut together, or use him to move Peanut to FS. Lots of options. Just Robinson by himself would upgrade the D significantly. Robinson plus an improved pass rush? That's how you return to the top quickly. I hope management sees this one as an obvious move. I also think Pepper's price might drop...there's a lot of talk about him not playing every down, etc.

Somebody please tell me this story is wrong. If not...wow. Apparently he died this morning in South Carolina. Tragic turn of events. No idea what actually happened, but this is just terrible news on so many fronts. This has got to be as bad an offseason as I can remember. I was really hoping, with an offseason with Marinelli, Adams would finally realize his potential this coming season and be our starting DE. So much for that. Thoughts and prayers to his family.

Well, I'm glad that's done with. Idonije gets a 2 year extension worth about $7 million.

Good move by the Bears...he has played really well, and is incredbly versatile on the line. Good use of the money we have available. I think he's a much better investment than 'Wale, who I really hope we don't extend, or resign. According to the article, it looks like we've also signed most of our draft picks...top 3 picks still have to sign, though.

his shoulder is jacked up - broken scapula. espn said he's out 2-6 weeks. so, it seems he won't be in for the last 2 games of the season. maybe that means "the burner" has a chance to run wild next week, though kevin williams is still a beast, as is allen. with two major running teams coming up, i'm slightly more optimistic about the chances the vikings lose out. though we still have to win 10.

when are we going to find out if they are actually going to be suspended? i don't think they're really guilty of anything steroids-related, but they did violate league rules agreed upon in the collective bargaining agreement. metcalf did his time earlier this year for a similar situation. i think the league needs to revisit this stuff as is, but for the time being, the rules are the rules. if they actually didn't play last weekend, i'm pretty sure minny would have lost to detroit.

this is getting ridiculous. bowman, after getting a lot of dap for his work on sunday, might be out for the season with his bicep injury. good god, our secondary is getting beat to hell. every freaking year this seems to happen. our secondary can never seem to stay healthy. i hope all our DBs are healed up during the off week. if not, man, we're in serious trouble, considering the fact that our d-line cannot pressure qbs at all. though maybe babich will use the bye week to finally scrap the cover-2 in favor of more physical coverage.

According to this article, Gio's en route to the big club. While I would have preferred to have him stay down just a little bit longer to keep working on his control, he has been dominating AAA at times. I suspect if Meyer didn't have to pitch last night, he would have gotten the start Thursday. Instead, looks like it's Gio's debut. If Eveland gets his control back, I wonder if he comes back up (and Gio goes down) in a few weeks. Well...let's see what the kid can do Wednesday.

it's orton's turn now to start. smart move...we need to see if kyle has progressed much to be either a legit #2 (ours, or to trade) or compete for the #1 job next year. i hope opening up the playbook for him will allow him to play much better than he did as a rookie. orton was one of the best QBs in college at purdue and carved up good defenses regularly. hopefully his mediocre stats before were mostly a result of a) being a rookie, and b) having a majorly scaled back playbook.

whew...at least he won't have to spend the offseason rehabbing from surgery. though it seems certain that he's done for the year. bring on orton - season's over, we need to see if he can at least be the #2 next year. i also think grossman returning is a lock...nobody is going to give him a big contract. we lose nothing by giving him a short, incentive-based deal.

sun times article drops this gem. i had no idea tillman was hurt that badly...ankle injury. man, this game absolutely killed us. harris might be out a month, we lose both CBs, our QB gets dumped, and our SS breaks his hand. well, i guess the move to griese makes more sense, at least for the short term, now. we absolutely cannot have our offense hurt us at all with turnovers for a few games. i hope backus and johnson both are out this week for detroit, or else our defense is in a lot of trouble.

haven't seen anybody come our way from arizona. does that mean no deal was reached and we basically gave him away? as maddening as he had been this year for us, wouldn't he have been a type b free agent, considering how good a reliever he had been for us the past 2 seasons? we could have at least gotten a decent draft pick had we sucked up the cost of keeping him the rest of the year.

did anybody catch this article, mentioning chavez having a nerve problem, not tendinitis? maybe this explains why he's been swinging the bat much better the last few weeks? the article is really encouraging, pointing out that they've been able to treat him much more precisely for his woes. on the other hand, it means the a's medical staff missed yet another  diagnosis for about 2 months w/ chavvy - i know, its tough to pinpoint things sometimes, but they consistently miss things. does this mean the old chavvy is back? because that would be fantastic.

the consensus is that the braves totally swindled us in the hudson trade - two buck chuck was pretty atrocious (and was traded for nearly nothing this past week), cruz was inconsistent (though he netted us a potential lefty starter (or trade bait) in halsey), and the oft-injured and ineffective dan meyer. but it seems meyer was finally getting healthy this spring. i remember reading accounts of how everyone thought he was throwing the ball exponentially better in spring training. and his stats this year have been very encouraging (albeit a tiny sample size). 3 starts:
AA: 4 IP, 4H 3ER, 3K, 4BB
AAA: 5 IP, 1ER, 4H, 2K, 1BB; 5IP, 0ER, 4H, 5K, 1BB
if meyer can stay healthy and perform somewhat consistently at AAA this year, i think he can regain his blue-chip prospect status. it looks like he's got the shoulder problem that has plagued him since the trade fixed...at least for now. while our farm system is pretty weak in general, we might have some interesting pitching prospects - especially if meyer is back. which is a big if.

well, we got some depth on the d-line, now. i'm curious how much money we gave him. 4 year deal, according to espn. so long as it isn't for a ton of money, i like the move. adams can definitely play, and will fit in our DT rotation nicely, especially considering the loss of boone, probably scott, and maybe tank for a few games.

seems like bobby decided not to make alterations to his swing as previously expected. i was disappointed to hear about this, because i think he could still get lots of power w/ a more compact stroke while not killing his back. that being said, i guess it is hard to make a change like that after swinging one way your whole life. however, crosby, even with those hellacious cuts, was around a .300 hitter until he got to the majors. so part of me thinks he can still be a good hitter w/ some adjustments while swinging for mars. is it better pitch anticipation? learning to trust his hands more so he waits a little longer? willingness to go the other way on outside pitches? better command of the strike zone? seems like these are all flaws crosby has, but all things he could improve on, even with his swing. thoughts?

because the giants had one of the 15 worst records in baseball last year, they keep their #1, right? we get a sandwich + the giants 2nd round pick, correct? if that's true...well, that blows. i never liked that rule. considering the parity in the middle of MLB (the top teams usually stay the same), there isn't a hell of a lot of difference between having the 10th worst record and the 17th worst record. i understand protecting the absolute worst teams - limiting it to the 5 worst teams makes sense. oh well, at least the giants 2nd round pick will be a high one.

[EDITOR'S NOTE: The A's picked up two players today and lost one in the Rule 5 draft. Billy Beane kept true to his word and took an outfielder from the Indians organization rather than the one of the two pitchers everyone was clamoring about. The A's lost Jared Burton to the Reds but also got a pitcher from the White Sox. - Blez]

Guess this throws off the speculation that soria or strop would be picked #1. it seems odd to trade up to #1 if we aren't thinking about keeping this kid, so maybe he'll stick around. he had a decent season at AA, .296 BA, .370 OBP, .528 SLG, . 898 OPS. he's not a kid, though, 24 last year. i know we were looking for OFers, but given the live arms (soria, strop), i'm a bit surprised with this pick. also, jared burton was picked by the reds in the 1st round.

Rosenthal reports Jason Schmidt has agreed to a 3 year, $47m deal w/ the Dodgers. Interesting in terms of contract length...this might make Texas' supposed 6 year $100m plus offer to Zito more appealing. Though Zito might still get deals for 5+ years, given his incredible durability. The Dodgers were interested in Zito at one point, but it's safe to say that ship has now sailed. This is quite a bit of scratch for Schmidt, but if healthy, he's an excellent pitcher. Plus, it's only 3 years, making it much more reasonable.

Well, some bit of justice was done today. Jeter, while having a wonderful season, was not awarded the MVP, and one of the three Twins players more worthy of the award than almighty Jeter (Santana, Morneau, Mauer) did take home the hardware. And hey, look at that, Frank the Tank, formerly one of ours, finished in fourth place. Still think Toronto is nuts to pay him as much as they are, but he did have a great comeback season with us. Anyway, I can't wait to hear all the Jeter people talk about how he was robbed. Which is something, considering he isn't even the best player on his side of the infield on his own team.

i know we're getting 2 #1's (probably, at least, so long as he signs w/ a decent team, which seems likely) for zito. do we get any compensation for frank? he's gotta be a type a free agent given his fantastic season, no? toronto's 1st round pick isn't lower than 16, so we get that and the sandwich pick, right? and what do you think we get for payton? is he a type a free agent? type b? he did almost hit .300 this year.

wow, big news here. looks like francisco is done until 2008. again, another reason why you do not ever rush back top young pitchers - he was only out of commission for a month and some change after the initial strain, which is nowhere near enough time. makes me very happy we kept harden on the sidelines as long as we did. count him, chacin, and burnett among those who were brought back properly from elbow strains this year.

well, look at that. the sun rose again...well, sort of. it's pretty cloudy here in DC, though that just may be a result of all the toxicity emanating from capitol hill. damn politicians. anyway, time to get those game 1 memories out of our system and watch E-Lo do his thing in the company of fellow A's fans. So here we go...

per the AP wire. dammit, i was hoping for some way the injury wouldn't cost ellis the whole postseason, but that seemed way too optimistic, considering it was his throwing hand. i guess the question now is, do we slide jimenez to SS or 2B? he supposedly can play all infield positions. if he can do an adequate job at shortshop, scutaro is a better defensive 2B than SS. but if scutaro's defense at SS is markedly better than jimenez's, then i think we keep him there, since SS is a more premium defensive position. tough break for ellis, he was doing well this postseason (and had been hitting well over the last month or two of the season, following his slow start). a big loss for us (i think we had too many healthy players on our roster and the baseball gods must have noticed), but one that i think and hope won't be too bad given our depth.

Poll

Who plays where?

14%

A. Scutaro 2B, Jimenez SS, pray for no injuries

8 votes

67%

B. Scutaro SS, Jimenez 2B, pray for no injuries

38 votes

5%

C. Doesn't matter, both are about the same at each position

3 votes

12%

D. Doesn't matter, according to the media coverage, the A's have no chance beating the Twins, anyway

7 votes

56 votes | Poll has closed

reading all the talk about johan the great...yes, he is great, the best pitcher in baseball, but you have to remember one thing: the twins still have to beat barry zito. and possibly twice. and we're not talking about regular season barry, but postseason barry. that is not an easy task to do. i don't know what it is, but z turns it on in the postseason every time. maybe it's the knowledge that he won't get many more turns to get back at a team. knowing how much he prepares mentally, i think he just puts himself in a different level in the postseason. let's look at his numbers:

October 7, 2000 at Yankee Stadium:
5.2 IP, 7H, 1ER, 5K, 2BB (beats the yankees in a must-win game to force a game 5)

October 13, 2001 at the Coliseum:
8 IP, 2H, 1ER, 6K, 1BB (outdeuled by andy petite (correction, mike mussina) - slide, jeremy, you juiced-up bastard)

October 4, 2002 at the Metrodome:
6 IP, 5H, 3ER, 8K, 4BB (wins Game 3)

October 2, 2003 at the Coliseum:
7 IP, 5H, 1ER, 9K, 2BB (gets the win by shutting down the red sox)

October 6, 2003 at the Coliseum:
6 IP, 4H, 4ER, 4K, 2BB (pitches on short rest for the first time, really has only one bad inning with a walk, then leaves a curve up that manny gets for a HR)

that's pretty damn impressive. he basically has had ONE bad start, and again, it was his first on short rest against a really potent offense in the red sox. true, santana has pitched very well in the postseason, but zito has been just as good. so even though i won't be able to see the game (hello vcr, goodbye internet/AN during the afternoon), i feel zito is just as hard to beat in the postseason as santana. he might lose, but it's not something any of us should be ready to concede just yet. barry is a beast in the postseason. given that this is his (almost certainly) last year in the green and gold, and given his love of this team, i'm sure he's going to bring some serious game come tomorrow. johan is as close to a guarantee as possible, but zito in october can match up with anyone.

This is certainly not good news, though it's not official or anything. Macha has voiced similar concerns before, but this seems a bit more pessimistic than normal.

"I have a lot of things to worry about right now and it doesn't look like he's coming back, so that's not on my list," manager Ken Macha told reporters before Tuesday's game at the Metrodome, basing that on reports he'd received that Crosby still has some pain in his back.
Now I've been down on Crosby's offense all season long (you gotta make adjustments at the plate, Croz!), but he was a lot more reliable on defense than Scutaro. If he's done, I hope Marco can pick up his defense a little bit.

Poll

If Crosby is done for '06...

29%

A. Who cares? I could hit better than homeboy...

24 votes

30%

B. Marco Scutaro, everyday shortstop? Uh oh

25 votes

2%

C. No worries, we have Antonio Perez (gunshot goes off)

2 votes

19%

D. Hey, if Harden comes back, whatever.

16 votes

18%

E. Come off-season, bye bye training staff (wtf were you thinking letting Crosby come back so quickly in the first place?????)

15 votes

82 votes | Poll has closed

The A's, riding Swisher's grand slam blast and Frank-being-Frank's nightly homerun beat the Rays 8-6 last night. Nice to see Swish have a 4-4 night. We need him to hit like he was earlier in the season. His and Thomas' one-upmanship on homers and and big hits has been fun to watch.

The offense looked pretty good, but Danny Haren had another rough start, though.

"It wasn't pretty," said Haren, who allowed 10 hits and six runs in six innings. "I thought I battled." Does anyone else think Haren could use a skipped turn in the rotation? It seems that all our starters, minus Loiaza (waiting for lightening to strike me) have been scuffling lately.

Street also pitched his first game off the DL. He looked okay, but most importantly, he felt okay.

Street admitted he was anxious when he came in but felt more confident that he wouldn't re-injure himself.
"It took a while,'' he said. The third at-bat "I was like, 'OK, it's fine, it's not going to give way.' '

Looks like Kotsay could be out for the week, due to back issues. Though nothing is certain just yet. Then again, playing 6 games on turf is never good.

Looks like Arn and Billy are going to start chatting on an extension for Frank. I hope we can get something done that works for both sides. Apparently Frank really wants to come back, and it definitely seems like Billy and Lew want him back. Also, Tellern mentioned wanting to broach the topic of an extension for Kendall, in which he said they might find a way to reduce the amount owed next year (about $8m from Oakland) in exchange for a more years. I'd be really happy to have Kendall for a few more seasons at a fair price (around $5m per would seem reasonable). He could be a great teacher for Suzuki and our other catchers coming up.

Jason Windsor has been called up by the A's. Seems like a smart move to help strengthen the 'pen, plus give him some exposure to the pennant race. On top of all that, given that most of our starting rotation seems to be going through dead arms right now, he could make a spot start if need be.

And most important of all...Rich "I 'Ain't Dead Yet, Muthafu$*a!" Harden threw a 40 pitch session yesterday and felt great. It seems more and more likely that Rich is going to pitch for the Green and Gold in September.

If all goes well, Harden could be back next week sometime, probably working in relief, at least initially. One of the A's top two starters, Harden has been out more than three months with a strained elbow ligament.
He's scheduled for a simulated game Sunday morning, though that will depend on how he feels, then he could go on a rehab assignment if any of the minor-league teams are still in action, according to assistant general manager David Forst.

Poll

If Rich Harden returns this year, what role should he have?

27%

B. Stretch him out to be a starter from the get-go

44 votes

8%

C. Send him to any minor league team that has games left (or AZ) and let get some rehab starts

14 votes

42%

D. Let him work out of the 'pen and increase his innings gradually

67 votes

10%

E. Sucka, dead people can't pitch in a pennant race!

17 votes

10%

A. Put him in the 'pen, make it invincible

17 votes

159 votes | Poll has closed