SB Nation User Blog: notsellingjeans

2010 Off-Season Blueprint

notsellingjeans — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 13:45:01 -0000

Should the A's spend this offseason, or save? Should the team sign a few established veterans with question marks, or simply let the kids play?

AN seems divided. The community is struggling to reconcile its desire to be competitive and spend an available $10-15M, with the painful realization that a.) much of the organization's best internal talent is still 1-2 years away, b.) the team had the worst attendance in baseball last year, and c.) the team, as presently constructed, will not make the playoffs in '10.

There's one very unique way, and one very unique target, who allows the A's to reconcile those two stances. This post will discuss that offseason strategy after the jump.

This post will be broken up into three sections:

I. Roster Moves II. Justification/Analysis III. References/Resources

This is not typical AN style, but I think it will make it easier to navigate. As you're reading the first part, if you find a completely unsupported statement, please have faith that the explanation or citation is to follow.

I. 40-Man Roster Moves and Active Roster Decisions

A. Let Garciaparra, Kennedy, Crosby, Tomko, and Duke all leave in free agency.

B. Outright/nontender Casilla, Denorfia, and Marshall.

C. Protect FDLS, Carter, Lansford, Recker, Figuroa, and Wimberly from the Rule 5 draft by adding all six players to the 40-man roster prior to the November 20th deadline. I don't really think the team needs to protect all these guys, and I don't think they will, but I'm sticking to a clear emphasis on the future here in this post and each of these may have some future value.

D. Sign 21-year-old Cuban free agent left-handed pitcher Aroldis Chapman to a front-loaded, eight-year, $60-million deal.

E. That leaves exactly 40 players on the 40-man roster. Treat Eric Chavez and Brett Wallace as a "1-for-1" on the 40-man roster from the start of spring camp. Wallace currently isn't on the 40-man. But as soon as Chavez inevitably breaks down and needs to placed on the 60-day DL, immediately purchase Wallace's contract and annoint him the starting 3b, whether that happens in late March, May, or later in the season.

F. Let Eric Patterson, Travis Buck, and Aaron Cunningham get a lot of at-bats in Spring and compete for two roster slots. Let Gregorio Petit be the backup middle infielder, since he's a good defender and can play a capable shortstop. Thanks in part to drafting Grant Green, the organization has enough shortstops that it can promote internally and still survive the graduation of Petit and Pennington in the same year.

G. Explore a lot of cool offseason trades. Eventually, realize that no one wants to give up anything substantive for a reliever (Wuertz) or a left fielder coming off a horrible second half (Hairston). Keep both of them and hope the scenery changes by this July.

Here's how the 25-man roster looks on Opening Day:

13 hitters: Suzuki, Powell, Barton, Ellis, Pennington, Chavallace, Petit, Patterson, Cust, R. Davis, Sweeney, Hairston, Buckingham.

SPs: Braden, Anderson, Gonzalez, Cahill, Mazzaro, Eveland, Chapman (In the rare chance that all seven are healthy, the two least effective are optioned and join Simmons, Mortensen, and eventually a re-habbing Josh Outman in the AAA rotation).

7 relievers: Devine, Bailey, Ziegler, Wuertz, Meloan, Kilby, Gray, Breslow, Blevins (in the rare chance that all nine are healthy and effective in spring, option two of them, and they'll inevitably shuttle up and down all year anyway).

II. Justification/Analysis

The projected payroll of that group is slightly less than $50M. Given that the A's had the worst attendance in baseball last year, and no reason to expect an uptick in '10, I think that low figure is perfectly justifiable. I think that last year showed that average Bay Area consumers won't come out to watch the A's just to see a couple of big names. Even prior to falling out of contention, there wasn't a major upswing in attendance with the arrivals of O-Cab, Holliday, Giambi, and Garciaparra. So there's no reason to expect that adding Glaus or Beltre for '10 would have a positive effect upon attendance, either.

Eschewing the free agent market almost entirely, with the very notable exception of Chapman, afforded the luxury of protecting literally any Rule 5 eligible player that was even remotely intriguing and had future upside. It would be a shame to let a good player get away for nothing, only to use that roster slot to sign an aging vet who doesn't contribute to a playoff season in a one-year deal.

The above roster only has one sexy, intriguing new move, which will leave a lot of ANers flustered as they look at the exact same names who struggled to a sub-.500 season. But avoiding FAs also gives a lot of players currently in the organization an opportunity to prove themselves, and there's a lot to watch there as the season rolls on: Can Petit, Patterson, and Pennington be major leaguers? Can Barton be an everyday first baseman? Was Rajai Davis' 2009 entirely a fluke, or has he indeed made adjustments and improved as a major league hitter? Will I finally get to watch Brett Wallace play third base and make a determination for myself, instead of reading a bunch of vague, lame Internet reports and staring at pictures of his ass and legs to try make the decision? These are all questions I'm legitimately excited to see answered, and the pitching staff offers us similar ones. Avoiding free agent re-treads will give us the opportunity to answer more of those than we would've otherwise.

This thing will have to be rebuilt from the ground up. Casual fans will become attracted to this team if and when it becomes a dynastic, perpetual playoff contender and the same faces stick around for a decade instead of being flipped for prospects after three years. That's part of why I have no problem with annointing Wallace at 3b as soon as Chavez's body breaks down. Wallace turns 24 during the season next year and has had a full, successful season of AAA. I don't want a one-year stopgap; I want casual fans and their kids to get to know and grow attached to watching Brett Wallace. With a new stadium on the horizon, I hope they'll get to keeping watching him for the next 10 years.

Obviously the most radical suggested move is the signing of Chapman, especially at such a high cost. But I see no point in suggesting popular moves that are unrealistic. "We should sign Holliday on a three-year, $30M deal!" Most everyone would like that, but it would never happen. Similarly, we have to assume that signing Chapman would likely require meeting his top asking price. By now, all A's fans have hopefully accepted that Oakland is not the top destination for any free agent. That gives the team a few limited, undesirable options in free agency: 1.) pursue retreads and castoffs who don't have attractive opportunities elsewhere, or 2.) the dreaded "overpay," which is often a pejorative shorthand for "much more than the second-best offer on the table."

Clearly the team's recent free-agent signings have fallen into category #1, with mostly uninspiring results. I am advocating a radical, one-time shift to option #2 (well, until November of 2013, anyway). But I insist on quibbling with semantics here. An "overpay" implies that the player did not perform to the value of the contract he received. Thanks to his age (21), Aroldis Chapman is the extremely rare example of a coveted free agent who could actually "outperform his contract," or provide surplus value, despite accepting an offer that was signficantly higher than the second-best one on the table. That couldn't happen with most elite free agents. Mark Teixiera can't dramatically outperform his contract. He received a very handsome deal that is commensurate with his production - and that's all that the Yankees need. Tex's great season in 2009 is a perfect example - he produced 5.1 Wins Above Replacement (WAR), which was worth $23.1M according to Fangraphs' valuation system...and that was pretty close to what he was paid, when you factor in the signing bonus of his new contract. That works out just fine...for the Yankees. Their payroll is high enough that their free agents don't need to provide surplus value.

The A's can't do that. To win, they need to strategically pursue surplus value (and the accompanying surplus risk, yes) everywhere - even in free agency.

My point is, for the offer I've suggested, no one will know if its an overpay for several years. According to Fangraphs dollar valuations, there were 39 pitchers who produced at least $15M in value this year, and 45 who produced at least $14M. The contract I've suggested puts Aroldis Chapman in an A's uniform for eight years, from age 22-29. If four of those seasons are somewhere between "very good" and "great" - which I'm defining as the top 40 or so starting pitchers in the game via Fangraphs dollar valuation - then the deal actually has surplus value for the A's, even if Chapman does nothing for the other four seasons of the deal.

Chapman's incredible upside is what makes me feel comfortable that he'll perform at the level of "top 40 MLB SP" at least a few times during his peak. Six-foot-4, 180 pounds, a fastball that's been clocked at 101, and lefthanded. The links you'll find below indicate that his pure "stuff" (especially his fastball velocity and slider movement) already rank among the best in the world.

He's probably not ready to step right into the A's rotation. But the length of the deal, and Chapman's age, actually fall in line perfectly with the A's next strong contending window. He can spend the first 1-2 years adjusting, even in the minor leagues, and will hopefully be ready to justify the team's large investment when he's 23-24 in 2011-2012. By that time, Cahill/Wallace/Cardenas/Carter & Co. will be providing tens of millions in surplus value for the big club, and Chapman's contribution will help reinforce the A's as the new AL West force. Over the course of the lengthy deal, he would contribute to several A's playoff contending teams.

Contrast that scenario with spending $5-15M combined on one-year deals for Adrian Beltre, Brett Myers, Duke, or Troy Glaus. The outlay being spent in 2010 is still approximately the same. But the most likely scenario is that the team still doesn't make the playoffs and the player moves on after the season, with the A's having earned nothing from his time here, similar to Giambi's second go-around. None of those four aforementioned players will help contribute to the next projected A's dynasty, which is why I'd prefer to avoid each of them.

Mychael Urban wrote a recent piece on his MLB blog in which he insinuated that Giambi was critical of Bob Geren this year, and that the A's brass was wary of Giambi's influence on the younger players. That anecdote is part of why I don't want to bring in any one-year rentals that cost millions of dollars. I think that 30-something veterans who have already banked tens of millions of dollars in greener pastures earlier in their career are always going to be privately cynical about Oakland's attendance, the difficulty to hit in Oakland's park, the perpetual youth movement, etc. Giambi is, by most accounts, a great guy, and even he apparently groused about the situation. It's just too easy to visualize Beltre, Myers, Glaus, and others of their ilk struggling, and doing exactly the same. Honestly? I guess I'm just at a point in my A's fandom where I'd rather watch guys who are just happy to be there, still earning their first few million and happy to be on a Major League field.

III. References/Resources

Aroldis Chapman-related rumors, including a few different authors linking him to the A's.

Three different scouting-related articles devoted to Chapman: Here, here, and here.

Blez' two-part interview with Beane at the end of the '09 season: Here and here.

Three other AN perspectives on the A's potential offseason outlook (including grover's and Taj's): Here, here, and here.

The Rajai Davis Trade Market

notsellingjeans — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 14:13:11 -0000

Ironically, Davis' success has made him a polarizing figure on AN in recent weeks, as seemingly each community member has picked sides: ride this feel-good, improbable center field success story ...or sell high while we can?

This post won't answer that question....yet. We have to find a few hypothetical trade partners and packages first. You'll find that discussion after the jump.

Before we get any further, let's remember that the concept of "The Rajai Davis Trade Market" would've sounded ridiculous one season ago, when Rajai was claimed off waivers from the Giants and posted .288 OBP in about 200 plate appearances for the A's. That's part of why I doubt he'll be moved this offseason. He was ignored league-wide for a long time, earning a mention at the bottom of this article; teams won't suddenly forget that when it comes time to talk trade.

Despite being unheralded, however, Davis has been immensely valuable this season. Fangraphs places the value of his 2009 performance at $16.7M , ahead of Torii Hunter, Carlos Beltran, and Curtis Granderson. Davis has been worth a staggering $12.2M on offense alone in less than 400 at-bats, on the strength of a .374 BABIP. (For some perspective, Ichiro's career BABIP is .359).

He also fills a premium position with outstanding defense, which we'd expect to be a dire need for many teams. Strangely, however, it doesn't appear to be. Almost every team is pretty happy with its center field situation right now.

I prefaced my analysis with that for a reason: I don't want you get your hopes up.

Think about how hard it would be for the A's to reach a decent agreement for both sides on a Rajai Davis trade. Is Billy Beane going to trade a cost-controlled, outstanding defensive center fielder who is (apparently?!) capable of hitting .300 in the AL for a minor league reliever? I don't think so. Especially not one who is a great locker room presence, has great work ethic and will be a good role model for Chris Carter and a host of young position players who will join the big-league roster in the next few seasons.

So, the A's probably would desire a good starting pitching prospect, or a hitter who profiles as, "very likely to be at least an average major league regular." But how many teams would really be willing to give up that for a player who they completely ignored less than two years ago when he was available for free through the waiver wire? Especially when we consider that most of the league is pretty well-set in CF.

So, here goes: a humble list of hypothetical teams. I don't expect these guys to actively call Billy Beane.

Milwaukee Brewers: Mike Cameron is a free agent, and the team probably can't afford to fill that void expensively, given their immediate needs in the rotation and at catcher. The Brewers at a dangerous spot in the win curve; they won't be able to afford Prince Fielder in free agency and the next two seasons might be their best shot at returning to the playoffs for a while. If they make a decision to go all in during those two years, it doesn't make much sense to keep 19-year-old Brett Lawrie, who has established himself (along with Casey Kelly of the Red Sox) as the very best of the high school draft class of '08. Lawrie won't help the Brewers win anything during the next two seasons, but his maturation would line up very well with the A's projected run at contention. Lawrie has been moved off catcher and is now playing second base; with the A's, who will be cost-controlled throughout their infield in two years, all Lowrie would really need to do is hit, even if in an outfield corner if necessary.

Chicago White Sox: Count the "ifs": IF the White Sox decline Jermaine Dye's option and elect to cheaply improve their outfield defense, and IF they'd prefer Alex Rios to play in right field, and IF they are content to exercise Freddy Garcia's $1M option for '10 and make him his fifth starter, and IF Kenny Williams falls in love with Davis' gritty, Scott-Podsednickitty-style of grindiness, perhaps we have a match here. But the only player I like left in this trade-stripped farm system is rocket--moving SP prospect Dan Hudson, who passed through four levels this season en route to the big league cup of coffee he's currently sipping on. Hudson's a 22-year-old righty who's fastball tops out at 90 mph, which is the only reason that Williams - who seems to lean more toward "stuff" and scouting than sabermetrics - would perhaps consider him. Doesn't it only seem proper that all right-handed SP prospects with unheralded stuff named "Hudson" get their big break in Oakland? :)

The A's obviously have the relief depth to even up those deals if necessary; I merely included the principals (Davis for prospect X).

I'll leave you with this whopper, even less likely than the two above (It would make me sad, because it would cost the A's my two favorite players, both of whom seem to maximize every ounce of talent they have):

Kurt Suzuki and Rajai Davis for B.J. Upton and Dioner Navarro

(Again, those are just the principal names; you could make that infinitely more complex by adding quality major league relievers from the A's end to fuel the Rays' need to win now, and/or the A's taking on Burrell's salary to bring him back to the Bay Area and split OF/DH with Cust, the A's receiving a prospect not named Jennings in return, etc.)

What do you all think?

Next to go: Orlando Cabrera

notsellingjeans — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 08:28:16 -0000

The big story in all of baseball yesterday was the highly anticipated Matt Holliday deadline trade, as the A's received a handsome three-prospect return for sending the best hitter on the market to the Cardinals. Holliday instantly rewarded his new team with four hits in St. Louis' win Friday night.

After allowing myself a few hours last night to both pour over the stats of our three new acquisitions and to reflect on Holliday's contributions during his brief A's tenure, I found myself once again doing what A's fans are trained by habit to do: look toward the future.

After months of speculation and thousands of AN comments, Holliday was finally traded. So what's next?

With the trading deadline still one week away, there's ample time for Beane to continue to be active. And for my money, the player that is most likely to go is Orlando Cabrera.

All four of Cabrera's logical potential suitors are AL contenders: Boston, Seattle, Detroit, and Minnesota.

After the jump, we'll discuss each of those four teams and why Cabrera is such a likely candidate to be dealt in the next week. Hopefully you'll offer your opinions and perhaps even a reasonable hypothetical return prospect package for Cabrera from those teams.

Be sure to vote in the poll below!

I'll start with the reasons why O-Cab is so likely to be on the move in the coming week:

1. He's hitting. Entering Friday's game, Cabrera was hitting .365 and slugging .500 in his last 30 games. Sure, it's an unsustainable BABIP. But it also suggests that he's regularly hitting the ball hard, and I think we'd all agree there's some credence to the notion that, at the deadline, some GM's still value acquiring a guy who is "hot".

2. Beane has absolutely no incentive to keep him through the end of the season. Unlike Holliday, who would've likely yielded the A's two of the top 35 picks in the 2010 draft had the A's kept him through the season, Cabrera will garner the A's absolutely no compensation, despite the fact that he remains on track to finish the season ranked as a Type A free agent. That's because Cabrera actually has it written into his one-year 2009 contract that the A's can't offer him arbitration after the season! Thus, in a clear rebuilding year, Beane has every reason to extract some value for Cabrera from another team and to then give Cliff Pennington a 50-game audition at shortstop for the remainder of '09, to see if Cliff can be penciled as the '10 starter at the position.

3. Cabrera is perhaps the only starting shortstop available via trade this July. Once the Cardinals acquired Julio Lugo this week, a scarce shortstop became even more so. The poor supply puts the A's in the driver's seat, making it all the more logical to shop Cabrera.

4. Four AL contenders are hard up for shortstop production right now. As much as we at AN have collectively bemoaned Cabrera's performance this year, a quick glance around the AL at shortstop production really puts things in proper perspective. The Mariners, Tigers, Twins, and Red Sox all have legitimate postseason aspirations...and yet they each have some serious woes at the glamour spot on the infield.

Let's go through each of them, and also speculate as to whether Cabrera represents a good fit there:

#1: Red Sox. I believe this to be Cabrera's most likely destination. After all, he's done this before - the Sox acquired Cabrera in July five years ago and he was a key catalyst en route to Boston's 2004 World Series title. The Sox can afford to take on his salary, they seem to prefer a veteran clubhouse, and they know that he's succeed under the pressure of Fenway once before. Equally important, they have to be concerned about Jed Lowrie's very slow return from wrist problems and Nick Green's predictable regression over the past two months. The Red Sox were constructed this past offseason with a playoff roster in mind. Is this team willing to enter the postseason with Nick Green as it's starting shortstop? I say no.

#2: Tigers. Detroit has lost four of its past five games by the score of 2-1. Yes, Adam Everett has helped them shore up their defense, but it's hard to ignore his anemic .167/.231/.222 slash line for July, especially given that he's never been a good hitter in the first place. Jim Leyland is complaining about the offense in the media and, like Tony La Russa, he has more weight in front-office decision-making than the typical manager does. He seems like the kind of manager who would appreciate Cabrera's personality and enthusiastically endorse the acquisition. Another small factor here is Tigers owner Mike Illich - the Eddie Debartolo of MLB, who treats his franchise almost as a city philanthropy, willing to lose money in a desperate effort to win a title. He'd take on the $1.5M left on O-Cab's salary, just like the Red Sox would.

#3: Mariners. The Mariners traded away The Worst Starting Regular In The Major Leagues two weeks ago, sending shortstop Yuniesky Betancourt to the Royals. Now, Betancourt's Mariner replacement - Ronny Cedeno - is looking to take the mantle from Betancourt for himself. Cedeno's "hot stretch" in July has raised his season slash stats to .182/.232./318. Amazingly, both these guys are better than the player they ultimately displaced - ex-Royals shortstop Tony Pena, Jr., who couldn't outhit Kate Moss's weight for KC this year (.098!) Stories like these make you feel infinitely better about what Cabrera has done this year, even if he hasn't met AN's lofty expectations and propelled the A's to a playoff contention. They also illustrate the league-wide dearth of capable two-way shortstops in MLB. There isn't 30 of them in the world to go around.

#4: Twins. You've probably already read dfa's informative fanpost about a potential Cabrera-to-the-Twins trade, continuing an outstanding series of posts that dfa has done on potential A's trading partners. I've intentionally listed the Twins last here, because of the four teams, I feel the Twins are the worst fit, albeit still a pretty good one. The Twins are the least wealthy of the group, and I'm guessing they'd have the hardest time of the group swallowing Cabrera's salary. But there's a bigger factor at work here - the Twins are the only one of these four teams that already has several million committed to a shortstop currently on their roster. It's true, Nick Punto is hitting horrifically. But he's also owed $6M in the next year and half. And every indication is that the Twins love him and his headfirst-slide-into-firstbase-heart-filled-grindy-grit. MLB teams don't often easily admit mistakes, especially with team leaders, and moving Punto off of short or benching him altogether would seemingly be an admission that their two-year deal was an egregious error. Again, while this is perhaps the correct approach, it's just not one you often see teams make. Teams are far more likely to supplant a cheap, unheralded underperformer (like Nick Green of the Red Sox) than the veteran player to whom they've already committed millions.

Final thought:

(Since every contender could seemingly always use another reliever, I'd like the A's to try and package Springer and/or Wuertz with Cabrera to get the best prospect available via trade. But the Cabrera suitors are the key domino that needs to fall, the one that should dictate the action over the next week, because the A's are probably the only team offering an available productive shortstop to contenders. Plenty of non-contending teams can offer a good reliever, making the A's position less strong on that front).

Now, here's where you come in:

Please vote in the poll above if you have not already. In the comments, feel free to explain why you think Cabrera is headed to that team. Do you agree that Cabrera's hot streak and the scarcity of available shortstops make him the A's player most likely to go next? And for our prospect mavens: who would you want back in a realistic deal from each of these four teams? Do the A's need to get a fringy, major-league ready C/C+ shortstop back in this deal, or are they fully ready to let Pennington sink or swim on his own?

Poll

Which of the four logical O-Cab suitors is most likely to trade for him in the next week prior to the trading deadline?

Boston Red Sox

168 votes

Detroit Tigers

84 votes

Seattle Mariners

15 votes

Minnesota Twins

83 votes

350 votes | Poll has closed

A's trade Holliday for Wallace +2!

notsellingjeans — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 15:34:39 -0000

The Cardinals' other prospects included in the deal are, according to Tim Kurkjian, outfielder Shane Peterson and righty Clayton Mortensen.

(add 3, 9:35 a.m.): Buster Olney reports that the A's are paying $1.5M of Holliday's remaining salary, leaving the Cardinals on the hook for approximately $4.5M.

Dana Eveland: The PTBNL for Hairston?

notsellingjeans — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:59:42 -0000

I think it's very likely that Dana Eveland is the PTBNL that will be joining Craig Italiano and Ryan Webb en route to San Diego in exchange for Scott Hairston.

I think San Diego and Oakland's recent roster decisions have hinted at this. Here's why:

1. Today, the Padres DFA'd their current fifth starter, Walter Silva. Silva has been very bad in his six starts for the Padres this year, and the team desperately needs to patch up the back of its rotation. Injuries to Jake Peavy, Chris Young, Shawn Hill, and Cha Seung Baek have left the team scrambling for 5th-starter options...and frankly, there just aren't any left.

2. The Padres won't need a fifth starter again until Saturday. Eveland, having thrown only 71 pitches today, could potentially pitch Saturday on short rest.

3. As mentioned on AN in the epic 700-comment Hairston thread, Padres GM Kevin Towers has stated that the PTBNL is between two SP candidates, at least one of whom has major-league service time. Eveland fits that description.

4. The A's may have sort of "created" the opportunity for Eveland to pitch today. Admittedly, I'm going out on a limb here, and I don't mean to be disrespectful to Dallas Braden or his family in any way, but stay with me for second: Today was Dallas Braden's scheduled start. He is away from the team on bereavement leave, which is a 3-to-7 day period of time in which a player can leave the team in the event of a "family emergency or death of a loved one." When a player is on the bereavement list, he continues to accrue service time but the team is allowed to call up an active player to replace him until the player comes back from bereavement. That means Braden is probably skipping only one start. What's unusual, though, is that I haven't seen a reported reason given for Braden's bereavement leave. Teams often include that information in the press release. Pure speculation, but perhaps the timing of Braden hoping to visit a sick relative coincided with the A's wanting to find an opportunity to give Eveland a major-league start. Which brings us to Eveland's start today...

5. I would be curious if the Padres had a scout in the stands for Eveland's start today. I think today might have been planned showcase of Eveland. Granted, he didn't pitch well, but he was yanked really early, even for a struggling starter. He threw only 71 pitches. That leads me to believe the intent was to show, "See? His velocity is fine, and he's demonstrably healthy. And, he'll be fresh when he throws for you guys this Saturday." From the Padres' perspective - potentially acquiring a long-term asset/project - proving Eveland's health and velocity are far more important than the box score results of his pitching today.

6. Eveland is out of options after this year. Therefore, the A's would be far more desirous to move him than, say, James Simmons, who doesn't even have to be added to the 40-man roster yet. This is an important point: Simmons still has several years and all three option seasons to grow and develop as an asset to the A's; Eveland's time to be a productive asset on the A's is running short. If, for example, Eveland was pitching poorly next spring, the team would be forced to release him, knowing that he had no more options and that he couldn't break camp with the team as a productive American League pitcher. In that scenario, the A's would effectively lose Eveland for absolutely nothing, which is exactly what happened to Dan Meyer last offseason. That's not the case with Simmons, whose AAA struggles aren't as big of a problem because he's a less time-sensitive case. Worst-case scenario, Simmons could be added to the 40-man roster and operate as the team's 6th or 7th starter, shuttling up and down between Sac and Oakland as injuries dictate during the course of his three option seasons. That has value: Every big league team ends up needing seven starters during the course of a season. This example clearly shows how, even in a worst-case crystal ball projection for Simmons, his contract flexibility as an unpurchased contract makes him far more attractive to the A's than Eveland, with his expiring options status after this season.

7. I mentioned Dan Meyer as my example for a reason. I realize he's stranded an unsustainable amount of runners, but I would argue that Dan Meyer has pitched well by any measure this year. Remember, this is a guy who was basically kicked out of the American League last year. And now he's thriving. How does that relate to Dana Eveland? Because Dana Eveland's best chance of being a serviceable major league starter again is by heading to the National League, too. And, as Chad Gaudin and Kevin Correia can attest, the best opportunity of all exists in the pitcher's haven of Petco Park.

My thoughts are that it would be a good trade for both sides. You can disagree if you like, but I firmly believe it's easier to pitch in the National League (and the mounting sabermetric commentary and interleague play results would support that conclusion), and I also believe that teams can get away with carrying inferior 4th and 5th starters in the NL as a result. Eveland does not have the stuff to ever be a good American League starter, IMO. The A's have at least six guys ahead of him on the depth chart, all of whom do have the stuff to be good American League starters. By trading him to the Padres, the A's would be extracting some value from a player who they might lose for nothing as early as next April, due to his out-of-options status. From the Padres point of view, they get a guy who will take the ball every five days, which they desperately need.

NO(t)STRADAMUS: My Favorite (AN) Mistake

notsellingjeans — Wed, 27 May 2009 23:08:38 -0000

Did you make it this far? Whew!

Like I always say, any writer can lose his readers in the story itself. It takes a special brand of boredom to disengage the audience in the headline. But when you see an opportunity to mix Cheryl Crow, a French apothecary, and nonsensical grammar into the title of a fanpost, you don't hesitate; you act. You start slinging apostrophes now and ask questions later.

This is my first post in more than six weeks, and only my third in the last three months. I've also dropped game threads this year after managing Friday night's action last season. At first I thought I AN would struggle without eye-popping post-game headlines ("A's lose 7-0") and pulse-quickening teasers to the overflow game threads ("the game continues"). But somehow the site has held on.

With today's off-day for the A's, I'd like to turn the focus back on AN and introduce Athletics Nation NO(t)STRADAMUS, a celebration of self-deprecation. In (Not)stradamus, we each look back at our own bold, sometimes ill-advised predictions made in fanposts and comments. Especially in the preseason, but really all year long, we all enjoy "throwing darts at the board" and attempting to handicap the A's playoff chances, possible free agent signings, and hypothetical trades. The goal here is to look back at your own predictions over the last few months or years, and find the one that missed the worst. Looking back at your own archive on your personal AN page, you want to find the dart that not only missed the board, but impaled the bartender standing 6 feet to the left.

It could be a comment in a game thread or fanpost, or it could be a full-length diary you wrote that, looking back, really missed the mark.

Here are the ground rules:

You can make fun of your own poor predictions - and mine too of course, since it's my absurd idea - but please refrain from piling on when other people post their own NO(t)STRADAMUSes. Just chuckle quietly at your computer...they'll never know. But please do feel free to rip on your own contribution. It's easier to be funny when you're self-deprecating, and it doesn't offend.
Using the AN search function or your comment archive on your personal AN page, try to find the actual comment or diary and link to it. Sometimes it can be good entertainment to look back at an old discussion to see how strongly everyone involved felt about it at the time.
If you want, you can provide your own follow-up or context to the link.

I'll get it started. Without further ado, here's a few AN pieces I'd like to have back:

"All Aboard the Furcal Train!" - November 14th, 2008.

Can I get off now? What a trainwreck. The time stamp for this post says it was made it in the afternoon, but you'd swear I wrote it at 3 a.m., bleary-eyed and in nothing but my G.I. Joe boxers. (Don't lie. You've checked AN in a similar state once or twice yourself). Apparently at the time I was willing to give Rafael Furcal $60 million dollars. Remind me of this the next time I mention that my dream job would've been to be a major-league GM. As we know, Furcal ended up signing with the the Dodgers for literally half the guaranteed money that I suggested, and now has an OBP south of .300 and a nearly identical SLG% a quarter of the way through the year. Don't wait for the women and children to calmly get off the $60M Furcal Train. Just shove and push and do whatever you need to do to save yourself from that disaster of an idea.

"The Super Lineup" - April 24th, 2008.

What do you get when you cram the talents of Rajai Davis, Donnie Murphy, Chris Denorfia, Bobby McRosby, Emil Brown, and Old Sweeney into the same lineup?

A giant pool of suck, that's what.

But no! Apparently I can clearly to point to April 24th of last year as a date on which that I was a flaming idiot. At the time, my calculus was clearly this:

Against left handed pitching,

three mediocre right-handed hitters + SIX more shitacular right-handed hitters =

wait for it...

The Super Lineup.

This worked a grand total of once, against the Francisco Liriano the first time it was deployed last season. Then left-handed pitchers leaguewide remembered that those players are not good at baseball.

"NO(t)STRADAMUS" - May 27th, 2009.

I just have a feeling this one already sucks, even without the benefit of hindsight or anyone reading it yet.

So how about you, AN? What's your prediction or proclamation you'd like to have back?

A's Finalize 25-man roster

notsellingjeans — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 23:45:59 -0000

Announced immediately after today's game ended, per AP:

The Oakland Athletics optioned left-hander Gio Gonzalez, infielders Daric Barton, Cliff Pennington and Jack Hannahan and outfielder Chris Denorfia to Triple-A Sacramento after Saturday’s 3-2 win over San Francisco.

The A’s, who open their season against the Los Angeles Angels in Anaheim on Monday night, finalized their 25-man roster by officially adding pitchers Brett Anderson, Andrew Bailey and Trevor Cahill.

Oakland’s projected opening day starter Justin Duchscherer and right-hander Joey Devine, expected to share the closer’s role with Brad Ziegler, will open the season on the disabled list along with Rule 5 outfielder Ben Copeland.

-snip

This means that Gallagher is opening in the bullpen, which Slusser hinted at in a blog post today. Gallagher reminded her that he had served as a swingman before in his time with the Cubs.

Although the AP article doesn't say it, one can infer that two of the three new DLers - Duke, Devine, and Copeland - must be headed to the 60-day DL, in order to make room for Anderson/Cahill/Bailey. The A's had 39 players on their 40-man roster; placing two on the 60-Day DL would allow them to keep 42.

The 25 man roster looks like this entering the season:

Ryan Sweeney CF
Orlando Cabrera SS
Jason Giambi 1b
Matt Holliday LF
Eric Chavez 3b
Jack Cust DH
Kurt Suzuki C
Travis Buck RF
Mark Ellis 2b

(Geren used this lineup to close out Spring Training).

Bench:
Garciaparra 1b-3b
Crosby SS-3b-2b
Powell C
Davis CF

12-man pitching staff:

Braden
Cahill
Eveland
Anderson
Outman

Gallagher
Wuertz
Casilla
Bailey
Springer
Blevins
Ziegler

How do you feel about HGH use in baseball?

notsellingjeans — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:12:17 -0000

baseballgirl note: Southern California A's/Angels April 7th game - FINAL DEADLINE this Monday!

Let's imagine for a moment that every taxpayer in America received this letter in the mail from the IRS next week:

Attention hard-working Americans,

Due to staffing shortages, the Internal Revenue Service will not be auditing any of your personal tax returns in 2009. Please continue to fill these forms out honestly, fully reporting all of your sources of income. Do not inflate or invent any deductions for yourself, either.

Hmm...would we have a few cheaters on our hands?

While the national media once again turns its spotlight on steroids, I find myself listening to Alex Rodriguez's suspicious interviews and thinking once again about baseball's puzzling stance on Human Growth Hormone.

HGH is on the list of Major League Baseball's banned substances. However, unlike steroids and amphetemines, it is not tested for in MLB, in part because an accurate HGH test would require the testing of blood rather than urine and the CBA doesn't allow for such testing. Much like the silly IRS example above, baseball's HGH policy is a rule with no reinforcement - and thus, no chance of being universally abided.

Like steroids and amphetamines, HGH is also on the list of banned substances in the NCAA and in the Olympics, but its reputed benefits in healthy adults are controversial. Some athletes claim that HGH has improved their vision, helped them build muscle mass, and recover from injuries faster. Others believe that HGH's effects are greatly overstated by pharmaceutical companies, and that their effects are placeboic.

As I've listened skeptically to Rodriguez's half-truths, I've found myself thinking again about HGH use, and the likelihood that some former steroid users have simply made growth hormone their PED of choice since the 2003 season ended.

Even if you don't believe in HGH's reputed benefits, consider for a moment its potential power as a placebo alone. Baseball is a very psychological game, and confidence is essential to success. If a player took HGH and believed that he had an edge on his competition, he would undoubtedly feel more confident than he had before, and perhaps perform better with that added confidence.

These are five questions that I find myself thinking about as I reflect on current PED use in MLB. I'd be very curious for your opinions on them if you want to leave them in the comments (I also provided a poll below).

How widespread do you think HGH use is in MLB? Less than 5%? 10%?
Would it bother you, as a competitive fan, if you found out that, hypothetically, the Yankees and Rangers had rampant HGH use in their clubhouse the last five years, while the A's had been "playing clean" from the top to the bottom of their 25-man roster?
Follow-up to Question #2: If you were the GM of your favorite team, and you knew other teams were cheating the system rampantly with no reprecussions...would you be tempted to sign a player with a steroid past and current HGH connections - hoping that he'd help connect his new A's teammates with the same illegal edge (but leaving you plausible deniability as GM)? Would you turn a blind eye to it in part to "keep up with the Joneses"?
As a fan of the A's, would you want A's players to use HGH, knowing that they couldn't be caught or punished for it, despite the fact that it is banned?

The fifth question is once again purely hypothetical, and I'm going to roll it into a poll:

Bobby Crosby is entering the most important year of his career. He desperately wants to earn his $5.25M contract, and simultaneously build a market for his services in free agency next year. He is booed at his job daily, and many loyal A's fans say and think hostile things about him, even though they've never met him. In the course of his offseason workouts, Crosby comes into contact with someone who can supply him with HGH, and that person testifies to its power. Crosby immediately thinks of the importance of the 2009 season to his future, and of how disappointed he's been in his own performance for several years.

Poll

If you were in Bobby Crosby's position, would you use HGH during the 2009 season?

Yes

332 votes

No

281 votes

613 votes | Poll has closed

DLD 2-7: O-Cab Interviews, A-Rod Steroids

notsellingjeans — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 15:38:38 -0000

Reading other people's opinions about a player is valuable, but I think you can often learn something new about a player when you hear him speak. When I find out that one of my favorite teams is considering a player, I like to try to find interviews that he's done in the past online.

Here is an interview Orlando Cabrera while he was with the Angels.

Here's an interview he did with the White Sox.

What I learned: Cabrera has an excellent command of English, is very polite and attentive in interviews, has an incredible passion for winning, and loves to read - he's read three Fidel Castro biographies and "just finished 100 Years of Solitude" at the time of the Angels interview. He also skillfully evaded several loaded questions about Ozzie Guillen, remaining positive.

Anway, they're worth a click if you've never heard him speak and you have a few minutes. I came away from them impressed.

Elsewhere in the blogosphere...

Dave Cameron just finished up a terrific series on replacement-level position players over at fangraphs.

A-Rod allegedly tested positive for steroids during his MVP season of 2003.

The Suns have placed Amare Stoudamire on the trade block, 12 days before the NBA's trading deadline of Feb. 19.

Link away.

And the final spot on the roster goes to...

notsellingjeans — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 07:32:59 -0000

If I told you two months ago that the A's were going to sign a certain 6-foot-10, left-handed free agent pitcher this offseason to bolster the young staff, you would've been ecstatic, right?

Well they still can!

It turns out there are actually two men in the world who fit this description, and the A's are showing interest in the other one.

Let's look at two obvious positives here, before delving any deeper:

Andy Sisco is the second-best 6'10" lefty in baseball.
He's never assassinated a pigeon on the mound.

In all seriousness, I think that Andy Sisco has a decent chance of being the final player added to the team's roster before spring training. Almost 11 months removed from Tommy John surgery, Sisco will be throwing for scouts (including one from the A's) today. If he has regained his pre-injury velocity - sitting at 92-93, with a high of 95 - he will garner a Major League contract. If he's throwing in the mid-80s, he'll have to settle for a minor-league deal.

A 2005 Rule 5 Draft pick of the Royals, Sisco intrigues me for a variety of reasons. The A's have expressed an interest in adding a second lefty bullpen arm to complement Blevins, and the newly 26-year-old Sisco is the only name available that offers some upside. Here's the rest of the remaining lefty reliever market - the general description is aging LOOGY journeymen with low strikeout ratios.

In contrast to that uninspiring list of players, Sisco might still become something better than what he's been thus far in his career. His development path during the past four years with the Royals and White Sox is grounds for an early-career mulligan in itself.

After being used exclusively as a starter in high-A and appearing in only 26 games as a 21-year-old in '04, he was plucked in the Rule 5 Draft by the Royals out of high-A ball in 2005. And he did a terrific job - 75 innings, 76 K's, a 3.11 ERA and 3.79 FIP. His usage, however, was a bit of a cause for concern - changing roles and leaping from 25 high-A appearances to 67 big-league ones the following year. Might that radical change at age 21/22 have put added stress on his arm? Maybe.

Sisco regressed badly the following year and instead of sending him down to AAA, the Royals inexplicably let him "wear it" to the tune of a 7.10 ERA over the course of the '06 season in 65 more appearances of work.

The Royals then decided he needed to throw more, so they sent him to the Mexican League, where he was sent home after just two weeks for eating tacos during the first inning of a game.

Soon after he was traded to the White Sox for the '07 season, where he quickly found residence in Ozzie Guillen's doghouse (shocking!) and was sent down to AAA...where he should've been the year before. By the start of the '08 season, the injury was starting to nag him and he ended up having surgery before he ever pitched in an '08 game.

I go through all this to point out that maybe Sisco is more than just some ugly numbers and control problems, in hopes that you don't dismiss him out of hand when you see his stats. Extremely tall pitchers like Sisco are notorious for harnessing their mechanics later in their careers than their shorter counterparts do. Perhaps some newfound maturity, patient coaching, and a laid-back clubhouse will provide Sisco with the environment and the situation he needs to reach his potential.

If he demonstrates that his arm is back in today's open tryout, Sisco can stand out from that linked list of journeyman lefties in a several ways:

a.) By my calculations, he still has one usable option left. He spent less than 20 days down on the farm with the Royals in '06, preserving that option year, before the White Sox burned options on him in '07 and '08. That means that the A's would always have the flexibility to send him down to AAA and work out kinks if need be. It also gives them more roster flexibility to build a roster week-by-week that fits their needs (12 pitchers vs. 11 depending on looming off-days, etc. Players who can't be sent down like Casilla and Wuertz make this difficult, so it's crucial for teams to carry a few major-league quality pitchers who can shuttle back and forth between AAA and the bigs as necessary during the year).

b.) If he thrives, and proves to be a long-term asset, the team can offer him arbitration and has contractual control over him for a few years to come. Sisco isn't close to the requisite six years of service to become a free agent. This, in essence, could make him a potential future asset of the club via trade.

c.) His age (26) suggests that he may still have a few peak years in front of him. If Sisco can once again be the pitcher he was in '05, he won't need to be used merely as a LOOGY - he can be an effective reliever against all hitters and work a full inning each time out.

d.) He might give AL hitters a unique look that they simply don't see anywhere else in the league, making him difficult to hit.

e.) He'll come cheaply (less than $1M), due to the health and effectiveness concerns.

Clearly, my realistic vote for the final spot on the A's 40-man roster is Andy Sisco. What's yours, AN? Vote in the poll below.

Poll

With their open 40th roster slot, I predict the A's will:

Sign a lefty reliever - Sisco, Dennys Reyes, Ron Villone, etc.

151 votes

Sign Orlando Cabrera

174 votes

Troll the waiver wire for other team's cuts, a la Rajai Davis last year

63 votes

Leave the slot open to allow for a non-roster player to make the 25-man roster out of spring training - Anderson/Cahill/Dillon/Bailey/Cameron, etc.

233 votes

621 votes | Poll has closed