The A's claimed Jai Miller off waivers from the Marlins.  Looks like another right handed hitting outfielder of the future for the A's.  Link to minor league stats:

http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?pos=LF&sid=milb&t=p_pbp&pid=455687

The link has his 2009 stats but couldn't find any earlier AA or A stats.  My guess is that he must have impressed the A's Sacramento coachs last year and Billy had him on the radar, or knowing Billy, he may have had him on the radar for a longer time.

Jerry Crasnick at ESPN's MLB Insider has the following partial quote:

".....While Thomas might fit as a DH in Anaheim or Baltimore -- or even re-sign with Chicago -- his most intriguing suitor could be Oakland. Thomas lives in Arizona and apparently likes the thought of playing for a West Coast club. He's looks like the kind of bold move that Billy Beane enjoys making to shake things up a little."

How about Thomas batting 5th behind Chavez.  Assuming Frank's health holds up (a big "if" if recent history can be believed) then that should make for a very interesting 2006 for the A's.....

What think ye all at AN???

AL Rookie of Year voting
Player            1st-place votes 2nd 3rd, points

Huston Street, A's      15  6  4  97  
Robinson Cano, Yankees   4  10  7  57  
Jonny Gomes, Devil Rays  2  8  5  39  
Tadahito Iguchi, W Sox   5  1  2  30  
Gustavo Chacin, Jays     2  0  4  14  
Nick Swisher, A's        0  2  0  6  
Joe Blanton, A's         0  1  3  6  
Clint Barmes, Rockies    0  0  1  1  
Jesse Crain, Twins       0  0  2  2  
Scott Kazmir, Devil Rays  0  0  1  1

By my rough count there were 8 players long gone at the beginning of '05 from those who ended the year with the A's in '04 (excluding Sept call ups).

It is never to early to start thinking ahead to Game No. 1 in 2006.  I predict that the goners will be:

Easy ones: Ginter, Rincon and Yabu

Not so easy, but gone: Hatteberg, Kielty,  Melhouse and Witasick

Difficult to say good bye to, but till gone: NONE

For a total of 7 players.

Oh, I almost forget: Ken Macha will also be gone, and will be comuting to work from his home for 81 games next year.

 
From M.Urban: They got solid pitching from their starter. They ran hard and smart on the basepaths. They turned double plays. They got yet another eye-popping catch from Eric Byrnes. They got three brilliant innings from the bullpen.

"That's the formula for a win," said manager Ken Macha.

"I feel bad," said a downcast Dotel, who suffered his third blown save in nine chances. "Today we had a chance to win, and I didn't do my job."

"Street was tremendous, and Kielty's play there was very, very intelligent," Macha said. "I was feeling pretty good about us at that point."

"Excellent work by Ricky," Macha said.

"I have to be careful with all of them," Dotel said when asked if he was pitching around Ortiz. "They're pretty good hitters. ... All of them."

"I was trying to throw that pitch away, but it came back [over the plate]," Dotel said. "I tried to hit my spots, but I didn't do it today."

"We played great ball," said Macha

"We did a lot of things right," added Byrnes.

And yet ...

"You really never know what's next in baseball," said Saarloos.

Said Street: "It was just that one pitch."

Where is the pain? Where is the anger? Where is the determination?  What I hear is resignation to their fate in facing another difficult (like in Cleveland last year) loss. [Not so incidently Mecir won a game tonight for Florida.] What I take from all of these quotes is a Team and Manager that was expecting to lose, but is happy with playing "great ball"; doing "a lot of things right"; never knowing what is next in baseball (translation: never knowing what is the new way of losing); and pleased with the "excellent work by Ricky".

Gee guys, it almosts sounds as if we won.

All I can add is that if getting 3 hits is "great ball" as far as Macha is concerned, what will he think if we are down to 2 hits tomorrow...."we had an off night, but hit some balls hard, but right at somebody?"

I've had some questions bouncing around in my head for awhile, and I am sure there are AN guys and gals out there with opinions, and maybe some answers.

1.  How important are agents?  Why does everyone now need an agent?  Why does Ken Macha need an agent? [besides preventing BB from stealing his pants.] Did Billy Beane have an agent when he negotiated with the A's, or have an agent on his ill-fated (thank God!!) one-day stay in Boston? When did all this agent stuff start, anyway?

2.  How much percentage do agents generally receive from each contract they negotiate? [I heard Dave Stewart at Fan Fest jokingly say his fees are 4%, not 5% in an off-the-cuff remark during a Q & A session.] Do they get a percentage of bonus amounts also? Are agent percentage fees fixed by MLB, or the players' union, or can they be any percentage?  Are there guidelines on agent's fees in the standard MLB contract?  Is there even a standard MLB contract?  If so, is it published anywhere on line?  

3.  How often do players get paid: Weekly, Bi-Monthly, Monthly?  Once the player gets paid, does he then turn around and pay his agent his percentage from each of his salary payments?  Are salaries paid on a 12 month basis, or based on the 6 month baseball season, i.e. if a player's salary is $1.2 million, would he get $100,000 each calendar month, or $200, 000 each month during the season?

My friendly FedEx guy just delivered my A's Season Tickets.  Got all of the 20 Fielder's Choice tickets I asked for with 18 of the 20 games in my favorite seat: Section 126, Row 1, Seat 6.  Right at the A's bull pen mound.  The seat lacks leg room and I am forever hitting my knees when I jump up, and there is no cup holder, but the view is fantastic.

Season Tickets have a new format this year with various games, info, humorous things on the ticket in lieu of a big photo of an A's player.  The "A's 2005 Season Ticket Holder" pen is also very nice.  I always request all the games with the Giants, Yankees, and Red Sox, and Opening Night, (this year that amounts to 13 of the 20 games). and then fill in with other games plus a few inter-league games: this year I have tickets to one Met game and one with the Phillies.

God, my wife is going to kill me this year, as from Friday May 13th through Wed May 18th I will be going to 6 straight games (3 w/NYY and 3 w/BoSx).

I am semi-retired, so do not work full time, but was wondering how other season ticket holders decide which games to see and where they will be sitting.

Good article on page B5 of this morning's Chronicle about a Wolff visit to the East Bay.  Includes some promising words by Wolff on Billy and the front office:  " We're lucky enough to be inheriting one of the best-run teams in baseball - and in all of major-league sports".

Need help from Blez or another ANer to provide the link.

Does anyone know who has the rights to Ariel Prieto, or is he a free agent?

Below are the top four pitchers in the Winter Mexican League.  Supposed to be a hitters league!!

Pitcher          CLUB   W-L    ERA  IP   H  BB  SO

Campillo, Jorge  CUL   10-1   2.05  88  66  17  62
Prieto, Ariel    OBR    8-1   2.09  82  69  16  53
Ortega, Pablo    MAZ    9-3   2.88  91  85  29  45
Campos, FranciscoMAZ    7-2   3.29  77  62  27  77

During most seasons the schedule in April and May would be such that a 5th Starter would not be overly used.  But this year for the A's it is somewhat different.  By my calcs a 5th starter will be necessary a minimum of 6 times as follows:

April 13th vs Toronto
April 19th @ Texas
April 24 @ Anaheim

May 4th vs Texas
May 10th vs Boston
May 29 vs Cleveland

That is assuming that the other 4 starters start every 5th day, as opposed to last year when Macha/Young skipped alot of 5th day scheduled starts to give an extra days rest.  I say a minimum of 6 starts for the 5th starter.  But with the recent injury history of Mulder and Hudson the powers that be in Oakland may start out the season giving extra days of rest from the gitgo, in which case Blanton, or whomever, will get an opportunity to chalk up as many innings as he can handle early in the year.

major league player: Kendall to go with Crosby and Swisher.  Did I miss any others?

Last year it was Kotsay, Kielty and Karros.

This year starts off with Kendall.  Do we resign Koonce? or is there something else in the wind?

Way back when (1970) Curt Flood (from Tech High in Oakland) objected to his trade from the St. Louis Cardinals to Philadelphia and filed suit against baseball's Reserve Cause.  I guess he just looked in the mirror one morning and came to the conclusion that "I am not the property for life of the St. Louis Cardinals". Curt was blacklisted by the owners but is a hero to this day among baseball fans and players (at least among those of us that remember).  He started what Catfish (another Oakland connection, need I remind) finished a few years later.

Before C & C, what did we all do to keep our minds active during the winter months?  Oh sure, once in a while the hated Yankees (yes they were hated even back then) would conjure up a "trade" with their "farm club" the St. Louis Browns (now the Balt. Orioles) and the Yankees would grab whatever missing parts they needed to win another World Series, but otherwise we all went into a long winter hibernation.

Well the Yankees are still at it and with the same thought process, but so are the rest of us.  All the teams are off-season players now, and this is so much more fun, with baseball being a 12 month a year experience. And as die hard A's fan, I want to give special thanks to AN and Blez.

Can someone please help me out.

When a major league team drafts and signs a player, the team has the rights to that  player for how many years before the player has to be included on the 40 man roster?

As I read all of the posting I see Eric's name appearing here and there as possible trade bait.  We all know how popular Eric is with the A's faithful, even more so, I suspose, than Ramon Hernanez was before he was traded, and there would be a somewhat major revolution if Eric was traded. So my main question to the A's faithful is:

Has Eric reached his potential, or is there a real "break out" year on the near horizon? Can  he be a star? Will he be a star?

I am not sure myself, but somewhere in my deep being I think he can be a real star, i.e. 35 Hr, 100 RBI, and 0.290 average. To me he obviously has the physical ability, but whether he has the mental discipline to excel I am not so sure.

We all know how personnel are always in a state of change with the A's, and many believe that the Bullpen will look radically different in '05.  Based on 14 position players and 11 pitchers breaking Spring Training Camp with the A's, and assuming a starting rotation of Huddy, Zito, Mulder, Harden, and either Blanton or Redman, that will leave a beginning of year Bullpen of 6 pitchers.  I project:

Dotel, Duke, Lehr, Garcia and 2 new faces.

Gone: Chad, Mecir, Rhodes and Rincon (with all traded except Mecir who will retire, or pitch again with Tampa Bay)

AAA/Sacto: H. Street, who will be with the A's full time by June 1st.

I know others think that Dotel should be added to the list of Gone/Traded, but think it more likely that he will revert to being a Set-up 8th inning guy with a new closer being obtained by BB.

So I really only see 2 new faces in the Bullpen which isn't that radical.  What say others?