Choakland Reduced to Joakland

by Rev Halofan on Sep 3, 2007 12:09 AM PDT in Angels News

Let us neither panic nor grow complacement...

Right now, our only rival is the Mariners, losers of 9 straight, rudderless with a ball-less manager who has no concept of leveraging a game's most critical situation with his best pitching. If they come back to take the division, we are the chokers, they still suck and as rivals are a withered, distant vision of the Kingdome's artificial turf circa 1995.

And that leaves the rivalry with which we have been obsessed for six seasons rendered meaningless. The former Philadelphia franchise has had an involuntary enema performed on it this season. A statistically unbalanced number of injuries leaves one to wonder just how hard the A's party. Another Jack Daniels and Red Bull at closing time doesn't help one during the day game the next afternoon, does it? It goes beyond the laws of chance to have the heaping helpin' of this physical unhospitality that has befallen the former Kansas City franchise. At some point, the A's fixation on stats has been at the expense of character, and the motley crew they have assembled has done a lot of its own disassembling.

But if the players are an irresponsible lot, management's failure to at least receive value from its bigger contracts at the trade deadline will, for years to come, be celebrated in Los Angeles of Anaheim as a failure to exercise a nuclear option Angel fans had come to fear about such a sub-par year from the Beaned one. Has Lew Wolff tarped over his scouting department to such a degree that there is not a prospect that could have come to Joakland for Piazza? For Loaiza?

Of course, if the hard-partying Disabled List's reputation precedes itself, is it any wonder Army Brat Beane let go of D.U.I.-steban without anything back in the DFA? Everyone laughs at Spicolli, but nobody wants to work with him every day, let alone pay him millions of dollars to only try hard when the next round is on the line.

This is a franchise that is slouching toward its Fremont condo development with a listless apathy that is as pathetic as it is laughable. And to make it even better, since Mariner fans at least have a sense of humor instead of that post-Moneyball Green-n-Gold sense of entitlement permeating the Choakosphere, maybe our new rivalry will be funner than watching the future liver transplants look sexy to the calculator-stroking stat crowd.

Well, the slouch is in L.A. of Anaheim for a few games, let's roll out the rolling papers and happy hours for a bunch of guys in their 20s who truly have their priorities as straight as staggering gets. Let's end any Magic Number complacency, bench Shields and mop the ratshit up with `em...

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On a somewhat related note

I never understood why people thought the whole Moneyball thing meant that Choakland was destined to win it all. The book was about how Beane had absolutely no payroll yet could field a decent team: hence the use of the word "money" in the title. It wasn't about how Choakland was supposed to be the greatest team ever (though sometimes the book read that way).

by BrickTamland on Sep 3, 2007 12:11 AM PDT reply actions

ironically

Prince fielder alone is making Beane look like an idiot with the perspective of hindsight and, oh yeah, player performance.

by Rev Halofan on Sep 3, 2007 12:15 AM PDT up reply actions

Pffh, they can't claim any more injuries

than we can. Half of our team has been injured at some point this season; even bench players have suffered (read: Mice-Tits, Aybar, et al). I would prefer a Oakland that can compete with the Angels on the basis that it's a more palatable rivalry of North vs. South. Norcal's most injury-prone in the green and yellow vs. Socal's heroes of 2002 fighting in red and white. If the rivalry were to move another 800 miles North, it would be too great a distance to be a truly meaningful competition of locale. I wish Oakland could have a park like AT&T that sits on the beautiful water front of SF where fans would go just to be at the park. Unfortunately, they get Fremont, which is known for suburbs and biotech companies, which isn't likely going to drive up ticket sales due to any aesthetic prowess.

by shiftyeyedgoat on Sep 3, 2007 12:54 AM PDT reply actions

fremont housing bubble

can you say STUCK INSIDE OF OAKLAND WITH THOSE CONDO BLUES AGAIN...

by Rev Halofan on Sep 3, 2007 1:05 AM PDT up reply actions

Oh, Mama, can this really be the end

...on the road....

by Jack Kerouac on Sep 3, 2007 5:53 AM PDT up reply actions

Why does oakland even have a team?

They ought to move to Vegas.

by melvintoast on Sep 3, 2007 8:26 AM PDT reply actions

charity on mlb's behalf

by Rev Halofan on Sep 3, 2007 10:46 AM PDT up reply actions

These are a few of my favorite Beanes

Don't you think the A's could use a slick-fielding 1Bman hitting .274/.392/.597? Yet the A's gave up Carlos Pena and Jeremy "56 wins by age 24" Bonderman for ... 200 innings of league-average Ted Lilly. Which Beane then flipped for ... 900 ABs of league sub-prime Bobby Kielty. Who Beane then ... released. Genius!
Ramon Hernandez, as a 27-year-old catcher, hits .273/.331/.458 with 21 home runs in 2003. So Beane packages him with outfielder Terrence Long for Mark Kotsay. Kotsay -- with well-publicized back problems -- has a terrific 2004, hitting .314/.370/.459 and playing a great CF. But then the back problems kick in, and his OPS+ marches down from 114 to 95 to 89 to this year's 55, as he misses more and more games each year. Hernandez, meanwhile, posts OPS+s from the catcher's position of 116, 109 and 107 from 2004-06. What does Beane do to replace that production? Why, he makes a smart trade -- minor league reliever Bret Price for the 27-year-old Michael Barrett. Only Beane then flips Barrett for 31-year-old Damian Miller. Barrett goes on to post OPS+s the next three years of 105, 113 and 121. Meaning two of the best-hitting catchers in baseball from 2004-06 were recent Beane properties in their prime seasons. Miller? He posts an average-for-him season w/ a 92 OPS+, then files for free agency. Now catcher-less, Beane trades SP Mark Redman and RP Arthur Rhodes for 31-year-old Jason Kendall, who had led the majors in games caught for most of the previous decade, and had slugged higher than .390 just once in the previous four years. Kendall -- who also has a massive contract -- proceeds to post OPS+s of 77, 89 and a half-season of 46, before being traded for 26-year-old .220-hitting catcher Rob Bowen, and 23-year-old minor league reliever Jerry Blevins. Oh -- and you rember the draft-pick star of "Moneyball"? The fat catcher who didn't look good in Levi's? He's now 27 years old and at AAA. The Angels have two major league catchers two years younger than him. Genius!
You think the A's could use a sweet-swinging 25-year-old outfielder with a career .298/.360/.464 line? Or maybe even a guy who for the last month and change has hit .336/.434/.639 in freakin' Petco? Nahhhh! Instead of either, Beane is left with a 26-year-old rookie reliever named Andrew Brown, and the ghost of whatever happened to Antonio Perez. That's the result of trading a good prospect for injury-prone, mercurial outfielder Milton Bradley, and then watching Bradley get injured, and then DFA'ing him before he gets mercurial, while insisting (absurdly) that he couldn't get playing time in Oakland's crackerjack outfield. Genius!
Choosing, among all the All-Stars that team was spitting out (Tejada, Giambi, Damon, Zito, Mulder, Hudson), to lock up long-term ... Eric Chavez! While overpaying for bad production from the likes of Jermaine Dye.
Then there were the large contracts to proven mediocrites -- Esteban Loiaza! Mark Redman! Terrence Long! I'll always treasure the reverse mind-bend required by Beaniacs to prove that these contracts were "what the market was giving up" that year or whatever.

Standard disclaimer: I-think-Beane-is-great-and-I-loved-Moneyball-yadda-yadda. But if he deserves credit for success, he deserves a kick for failure, and I just wonder how many times over the next six months I'm gonna read stuff like this:

A's general manager Billy Beane is reportedly a student of Silicon Valley business practices, and his player moves this season seem to reflect Kelley's aphorism. The A's come into the season with hopes of defending their AL West title. It's not too overly simplistic to say that Rich Harden got injured and the A's could not realistically contend without him.
As the A's have fallen out of contention over the past couple months, they have quickly rid themselves of veteran players whenever possible to free up cash and clear the path for promising youngsters. Jason Kendall? Move over for Kurt Suzuki. Esteban Loaiza? Meet Dallas Braden and Dan Meyer. Long time A's Bobby Kielty and Joe Kennedy have also been shown the door. So as the A's limp to a hopefully .500-ish finish, they're at least quietly laying the groundwork for next season's success.
They still don't necessarily have enough to challenge the Angels next season, especially if Harden still isn't healthy, but at least they'll know what they have. The A's like to acquire a lot of players and see who sticks, and part of that is giving those players playing time. Sure, you might end up with some Loaizas and Kendalls, but at least you also get the occasional Jack Cust or Chad Gaudin. In contrast with the seemingly comatose Giants front office across the Bay, and that doesn't sound half bad.

by mattwelch on Sep 3, 2007 11:01 AM PDT reply actions

C.C. Sabathia over Johann Santana

Cleveland leads Minnesota 5-0 going into the bottom of the 9th. If the Twins do not pull it out Johann Santana will be 0-5 against the Tribe in 2007. That makes Mike Scioscia look smart in having southpaw Joe Saunders NOT start against Cleveland in the up-coming four game series. Sabathia likely will have consecutive starts against Johann Santana and Ervin Santana. Ervin may well be the sacrificial lamb next Saturday night. That said, I pick Ervin to beat the A's tonight.

by Yetijuice on Sep 3, 2007 1:51 PM PDT reply actions