Don’t look now but The Oakland Athletics are in the thick of The
American League Playoff race. The A’s have won 11 out of their last 13
ballgames and they are now tied for the second wild card spot in The AL.
In the mid-to-late 90s The Athletics made the term “Moneyball” famous
as author Michael Lewis wrote a book detailing A’s general manager Billy
Beane’s propensity to use sabermetrics. Lewis’ book was then turned
into a film in 2011 which starred Brad Pitt. Some thought that Beane’s
system of taking players off of the scrap heaps had lost its usefulness
since Oakland hasn’t had a winning record since 2006, but could we be
looking at Moneyball Part 2?
The A’s were left for dead coming into this season after tradingAll-Star pitchers Gio Gonzalez and Andrew Bailey to The Washington
Nationals and Boston Red Sox respectively. In 2009, Beane acquired
All-Star outfielder Matt Holliday from The Colorado Rockies in the hopes
of using him for trade bait as he was in the last year of his deal.
Holliday was eventually traded that season to The St. Louis Cardinals,
but in the process Beane traded outfielder Carlos Gonzalez to The
Rockies. Since that time Gonzalez has gone onto stardom which included
him making his first All-Star Game appearance this season. Undaunted,
Beane has gone back to the drawing board of sabermetrics.
Beane has a new cast of youngsters trying to make a name for themselvesthat are blended with veterans. Former Red Sox farmhand Brandon Moss
appears to have finally found a home in The Bay Area. Moss already has
11 home runs on the season which is the highest of his career.
Outfielder Josh Reddick was a part of the trade that sent Bailey to
Boston. Reddick is finally seeing extended playing time and the results
are being seen. Reddick leads the team in home runs (22), batting
average (.271), and hits (98). Infielder Brandon Inge saw a decrease in
his playing time with The Detroit Tigers once the team signed All-Star
first baseman Prince Fielder which put Miguel Cabrera back at third
base. The Tigers finally released Inge at the end of April and since
then he is once again finding his mark. In just 58 games with The
Athletics, Inge already has 44 runs batted in. If it were not for Los
Angeles Angels rookie outfielder Mike Trout, A’s center fielder Yoenis
Cespedes would be the leading candidate for The AL Rookie of The Year.
The native of Cuba has a .301 batting average in 66 games this season
along with 13 homers and 50 runs batted in. Offensively as a team The
A’s rank near the bottom of nearly every offensive category in The
American League as they have come to rely on their pitching.
Young can be proud to know that a staff that has been held together by
spit and glue has the lowest earned run average in The AL at 3.44. They
don’t have one player that stands out as pitcher Ryan Cook was The A’s
only representative at this year’s All-Star Game. Cook along with
starting pitchers Jarrod Parker, Bartolo Colon, Travis Blackley, and
A.J. Griffin are not household names, but they are keeping their team in
ballgames as this team just finds a way to win.
In May, Oakland suffered a season high 9-game losing streak which
included series sweeps at the hands of The New York Yankees and
Minnesota Twins. After that The A’s just started chipping away. June saw
them post a record of 15-13 while July has seen them go 16-3 so far.
The A’s just saw a 7-game winning streak come to an end in a loss to The
Toronto Blue Jays, but in the process they have made a name for
themselves.
each game by one run which included a four-game sweep of The Yankees. It
doesn’t matter what time of year that you defeat The Yankees because
when you do people will take notice.
Coliseum which is a dinosaur for ballparks as it is the only
multi-purpose stadium still in use as they share the stadium with The
Oakland Raiders of The National Football League. With The A’s looking
for a new stadium as their future in Oakland looks bleak, it is nice to
see that they are giving the fans something to cheer about this season.
as Beane doesn’t have the payroll flexibility to spend like their AL
West rivals The Angels and Texas Rangers who have two of MLB’s larger
payrolls. This isn’t an Oakland team that has the likes of All-Stars
Barry Zito, Miguel Tejada, and Tim Hudson a decade ago. This Oakland
team has to continue playing hard every night and showing the nation
that underdogs do have a chance. When the clock strikes midnight on the
regular season, maybe the glass slipper will fit on the feet of the team
that wears white cleats.
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