The Oakland Athletics were surprisingly quiet at the trade deadline this year, but the organization made the right choice to stand pat—now they'll avoid several costly pitfalls. Sure, the A's traded for George Kottaras and shipped Kurt Suzuki to the Washington Nationals. Neither move was a big splash. Oakland didn't throw in the towel and sell off any veterans. They didn't acquire any big names for a late-season push. Perfect. Here are 10 reasons why the A's were right to skip out on major deadline deals.Begin Slideshow
As August begins to move closer towards September, the plucky Oakland A's simply continue to be the Steve Urkel of Major League Baseball: Uninvited, often clumsy and awkward looking, but damn entertaining.At 60-51, they are entrenched in a three-way tie with the Detroit Tigers (not a surprise) and another surprise team, the Baltimore Orioles, for the Wild Card. No more than one and a half games out lurk the Los Angeles Angels and the team that replaced Oakland as baseball's "Little Engine That Could," the Tampa Bay Rays.Having now played more than two-thirds of the schedule, the specter of an ...
The 2012 Oakland A's sustained a nine-game losing streak in late May and were 22-30 on June 1. As recently as June 30th they were still only 37-42. Since then they have surged, going 23-9. At 60-51, the A's are playoff contenders, despite carrying only a $53 million payroll, down from $67 million a year ago. Featured columnist Mark Reynolds recently wrote a wonderful article entitled, "Oakland A's General Manager Billy Beane Should Be MLB Executive of the Year." He reviews and correctly extols some of Beane's shrewd personnel moves, including the signing of Cuban star Yoenis Cespedes. I'd like ...
What a difference a day (and night) makes.Backed by another sparkling performance by Bartolo Colon, the Oakland A's hit four home runs and thumped the Los Angeles Angels 10-4 to move back into a playoff spot in the AL wild-card race. Colon only allowed an unearned run as he shut down the potent Angels offense over seven innings to move to 9-8 on the year. In contrast to Colon, C.J. Wilson was errant, allowing six runs (three earned) on nine hits and five walks in just five innings pitched. Oakland's onslaught began when Jonny Gomes lined his 12th home run just ...
Going into Tuesday's action, the Oakland A's have found themselves losers of their last three games and six of their last 10.They're trending downwards at the wrong time of the season.In what has been a surprising season to say the least, Oakland sits 5.5 games behind the Texas Rangers for the lead in the American League West and just a half game out of Wild Card contention.Of course, yesterday they owned one of those Wild Card playoff berths.So it goes in Major League Baseball.Over the last 30 days, rookie Yoenis Cespedes has been the only player on the team to ...
At the beginning of the season, the Oakland Athletics were among the teams people left out of playoff conversations.Now, nobody can stop talking about the Swingin' A's.Oakland is just 5.5 games out of first place in the AL West, and, if the season ended today, they would earn a wild-card spot in the playoffs. The A's have a very well-rounded team and lots of players who know how to come up with big hits.Even though the A's have been on fire, lots of people think they're pretenders and that they'll fall behind the Tigers and Angels in the wild-card race. ...
Rajai Davis' misplayed pop up led to a three run fifth inning as the Toronto Blue Jays held on to beat the Oakland A's 6-5 Sunday at the Coliseum. Davis' gift single led to a two run single by Yunel Escobar and an RBI single by slumping Kelly Johnson off hard luck loser Tom Milone, who dropped to 9-9 on the year. Milone wound up giving up six runs on nine hits while walking one and striking out four in six innings.The game started well for the A's when after a first inning run for Toronto. Derek Norris hit a ...
The A's have always had the reputation of being a rag-tag band of misfits, and I don't know about you, but that sounds like a bunch of potentially fun drinking buddies to me.That wasn't so much the case in recent years, but over the offseason, Billy Beane and company added some players who brought the wild back to Oakland. If that notion wasn't obvious, all one has to do is look at the way Oakland has won ballgames this year. Claiming their 13th walk-off win of the season in a thrilling 15-inning marathon Friday night against Toronto, they now lead ...
Ryan Cook allowed a ninth-inning game-tying home run for the second straight game. Toronto scored twice in the 11th inning to stun the Oakland A's 3-1 Saturday afternoon at the Coliseum.David Cooper blasted Cook's 1-1 fastball to right center field to tie the game at one. The A's had a chance to win in the 10th inning, but Josh Reddick struck out looking with the bases loaded. Oakland got a great performance from their bullpen until the ninth inning, as starter A.J. Griffin left after just 1.2 innings with tightness in his right shoulder.Jordan Norberto was fantastic, going 3.2 shutout innings. ...
Jose Canseco, age 48, has left the Worcester Tornadoes of the Can-Am League and signed with the independent Rio Grande Valley WhiteWings of the North American League. The Valley Morning Star reports that Canseco—still an official member of the Tornadoes—will make his debut with the WhiteWings in the coming days. Canseco played 20 games for the Tornadoes, putting up numbers you would expect from a 48-year-old: .194 BA, one home run, seven RBI, and 24 strikeouts in 84 at-bats. Aside from his low numbers, the fact that his former club had no prior warning of ...