Ever since the Athletics let manager Bob Melvin pack his bags and go to San Diego, it has seemed like a long and dark winter is ahead for the franchise and its fans. The skipper still had one year remaining on his contract but was allowed to sign on with the Padres without compensation, as Oakland seemed content with saving the roughly $4MM he was going to make. Since then, the questions surrounding the franchise have largely been about exactly how far they will go in stripping down the roster.
In a recent piece from Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic, he relays that it is unlikely they will bottom out to such a degree that their payroll drops as low as $40MM, a level that even the low-budget Athletics haven’t seen in 20 years. While that might sound like good news to A’s fans at first, it doesn’t necessarily mean there won’t be selling, as Rosenthal reports they are still “likely to trade almost every player with value on their roster” but could then patch the holes on the club “by signing a bevy of free agents to one-year contracts.”
As to how this would work, Rosenthal points to the 2014-2015 offseason. At that time, the Athletics were coming off a third consecutive winning season, yet embarked on a massive roster overhaul that included trading away Josh Donaldson, Brandon Moss and Jeff Samardzija for prospects. This led to three straight years of basement dwelling in the AL West while acquiring big leaguers – such as Ben Zobrist, Rich Hill, Ryan Madson – who would later be flipped for further prospects. Despite all of that selling, the payroll didn’t significantly drop in those losing seasons. Per Cot’s Baseball Contracts, it hovered in the vicinity of $80MM from 2014 to 2017.
As to who is expected to move, Rosenthal lists many names that have previously popped up in rumors, such as Matt Olson, Matt Chapman, Sean Manaea, Chris Bassitt and Frankie Montas. All of that group have been speculated to be trade chips due to their arbitration raises and shrinking team control. However, Rosenthal also says that “their available parts include even catcher Sean Murphy, who is a year away from arbitration,” and later adds that Murphy “will be a hot commodity in a market starved for catchers.” It has been certainly been noticed, including by MLBTR, that the free agent catching market in indeed weak this year, with the best option being 34-year-old Yan Gomes. Murphy, who just turned 27 and has four remaining years of control, would certainly be more appealing than any option on that list. In 182 career games so far, he has hit 28 home runs and slashed .222/.321/.431, a wRC+ of 109. When combined with his excellent defense, he’s produced 5.4 fWAR.
Jason Martinez of Roster Resource currently pegs the club’s 2022 payroll at $85MM, including arbitration estimates. Shipping out all the aforementioned players would subtract around $45MM and leave it sitting around the $40MM mark. But then, under this theoretical scenario, the club could then reallocate that money towards short-term deals for free agents.
Even if the A’s do decide to put this plan into action, it won’t be soon. As Rosenthal notes, most of their potential trading partners are preoccupied with trying to sign free agents before the CBA expires on December 1, which is widely expected to lead to a transaction freeze shortly thereafter. Despite all that, he reports that the Athletics have been “bombarded with trade interest in their players” and are “still gathering and organizing information.” That means any sell-off, whatever its eventual scope, will likely be crammed into the window between the thawing of the transaction freeze and the beginning of the 2022 season.
“… as Oakland seemed content with saving the roughly $4MM he was going to make.”
If that’s the case why did they exercise their option on him?
They did…back in June. The A’s have rarely not allowed anyone on their staff or Front Office to interview with other organizations.
That’s why they e
Dominated the sport since 1988
I thought this too, I think they were going to keep him around at $4M indefinitely. He really is a low energy guy who often looks lost out there. I think he wants to retire soon and put his money on SD winning a title sooner than the A’s, which is common sense.
Whatever trade proposals blue jays fans have for Jose Ramirez send them to Oakland for Chapman and add another two to three prospects and you have a fair deal !
Or not. Chapman’s value is maybe 2/3 of that of Ramirez’s. Overpaying for defence is nauseating.
Odds are there will be no big trade for blue jays and Indians ! Hernadez and Moreno for j ram is a joke of a trade ! Might as well have traded j ram to Yankees for Frazier and andujar , add about 18 prospects to hernadez and Moreno and Indians might even through in a reliever and cash
In all seriousness if j ram is traded anywhere it will come at a cost no blue jays fans or whatever team ahead of time would ever be willing to propose ( like it matters ) !
Where do you get the idea that Hernandez and/or Moreno would be traded anywhere ? Neither will in fact be traded ! Maybe Kirk, Grichuk, and any number of other prospects might be available , even Reese McGuire
Ummm baseball trade values Hernandez and Moreno value somewhere in the 80s and jram 73. So the jays would be given way too much.
Baseball trade values is also the worst possible way to evaluate hypothetical trades
It’s a lot more realistic than Joe blow random mlbtr commenter who is out of touch with reality. Their trade values seem a little off to given how teams nowadays value their top prospects so much. If Bassit is traded to the jays for example I’d guess their top 5 prospects wouldn’t be going anywhere. Probably Otto Lopez and prospects ranked 9,12 and 22 usually the way the trades have gone recently around baseball.
Not a guardians fan but in the case of Ramirez guardians don’t want to trade him they don’t have to trade him and they. Definitely won’t trade him for a total scrub like Randall g and some lower level prospects! They also wouldn’t care about the trade value chart they wouldn’t move him for hernadez and Moreno they would laugh at that lousy proposal!
As for athletics they seem to prefer quantity over quality so they may be more willing to make a trade blue jays fans seem willing to propose
@noel
I love commenters that talk like they know what’s going to happen lmao you have no idea
“They would laugh at that lousy proposal” lmao
Anyway, Ramirez is headed to the Dodgers for Lux, May, Busch, and Vargas.
Better then the blue jays package or crapola ! Lol Randall grichuck ! Is negative value ! Grichuck for will Myers ! There done deal
@noel
Once again you have no idea what the jays proposal is lmao I highly doubt grichuk would be included
How about guardians don’t want to trade Ramirez! They don’t have to and are under no pressure to do so and definitely not to any particular team ! Not a blue jays thing exclusively at all but to many fans give their teams ridiculous leverage in theoretical trade ideas !
Again not a guardians fan but if they do trade him I am sure it will come at a cost no fanbase spied approve of ahead of time ( would talk themselves into it afterwards)
Such pain.
I wonder what kind of trade package it would take to get either Bassitt, Montas, or Manaea?
Yankees might be able to package Torres Sanchez and bird for two of those pitchers
With Oakland cutting payroll I doubt they would be looking at Torres and Sanchez
I can see them taking Torres but sadly Sanchez has been damaged good for 3 years now
If Oakland wasn’t cutting payroll i doubt they would look at Torres and Sanchez
Bird is no longer with us, and Oakland does not want Sanchez ( I cannot blame them).
Bird? Might as well throw in Drew Henson and see if they take the bait
Bird for sure. Then they can throw in Frazier and Odor to possibly add Chapman to the deal.
Noel1982, Bird is not a Yankee since August. Sanchez maybe none tendered, he’s poor D, Cole doesn’t pitch to him,and if it’s not a HR it’s an out. Going to say no way.
Noel – My sarcasm detector is going berserk!
If manaea is packaged with Olson for example that could bring a really big return but it’s likely they get traded separately. I would love for the Yankees to get Olson. He’s been so underrated !
The A’s might have interest in Gleybor but certainly not Sanchez.
I’d suggest the A’s are looking for players with 6 years of control or close to it. And if the new CBA cuts that down, they’ll definitely want those sorts of players back in trade along with top AAA prospects.
You Yankee fans need to get off this kick of trading Gleyber to a rebuilding team.
That said, I think this deal is actually pretty decent
Olson, Chapman and Bassitt for Jasson, Gleyber, Volpe, Urshela, Deivi, Schmidt and Voit.
Why not include 100 million and the Yankees first round picks for next 20 years, etc….
Gleyber, voit have no value to a rebuilding roster due to contracts, already in arbitration years and they lousy for Yankees this past season
Noel1982, Bird is not a Yankee since August. Sanchez maybe none tendered, he’s poor D, Cole doesn’t pitch to him,and if it’s not a HR it’s an out. Going to say no way. And don’t include a player who making $$ like Gleyber or Voit because that taking salary back.
Take out Bassitt & Jasson, add Sanchez and cash to cover all but a million of each traded players 2022 salary.
Nothing about that deal is decent.
Oakland gives up two all stars, one being the best defensive 3B in the game right now, and their ace for a grab bag of of garbage made superfluous by the return going back the Yankees way.
If the A’s are seriously going to trade all of these players it’s very unlikely they would be dealt in one package deal
Yeh,yeh,yeh….same Yankee hate different day!
Noel1982, Bird is not a Yankee since August. Sanchez maybe none tendered, he’s poor D, Cole doesn’t pitch to him,and if it’s not a HR it’s an out. Going to say no way.
Even as bad as Sanchez is defensively he’s still one of the better MLB catchers overall and there is no reason the Yankees couldn’t trade him and pay his salary.
Rebuilding doesn’t mean tanking & I’d definitely prefer to have Sanchez on my roster if his salary was mostly paid by the Yankees.
When you look at the money for free agents, a team trading players like Sanchez, Torres, Andujar and Luke and paying their contracts is pocket change. For a team like the A’s, it lets you save money while still being competitive and gives you 4 assets with significant potential to develop trade value by the deadline. Sanchez as a DH who can back up at catcher is pretty interesting.
I hope the Jays target Bassitt. Nice Matz replacement.
Or Manaea if they want a lefty. Or montas if they want 2 yrs of control instead of 1
Bassitt-Groshans gets done I think
Lol are the jays getting two Bassits? I doubt Bassit gets the A’s a top 100 prospect and if they do it’s someone injured in the 80s or 90s.
Yes, there’s no way the A’s will get a Top 100 prospect- an All Star SP who’s making $4.9 Million next season? They’re probably going to have to pay half that salary too- there’s not a single team that will pay that salary for the A’s Opening Day SP
Problem with Bassitt is his age. Not so sure teams are chomping at the bit to give up a top 100 prospect for a 32 year old pitcher that’s averaged about 13 starts a season and isn’t getting any younger. He might bring back a couple of decent prospects but top 100 I doubt.
The projections I saw on Bassit and Manaea’s salaries were closer to $10m. With only one year of control left, that’s good but not huge surplus value. I suspect for those guys, you aren’t likely to get that value condensed into one higher end prospect. You are more likely to get a package of 2 or 3 guys a little less highly regarded than top 100 types. In a Bassit to Blue Jays case, I’d suspect an MLB close guy like Otto Lopez would be included and a couple more organizational top 10-15 prospects or equivalent. I think Groshans or Martinez (plus other pieces) might be needed for someone like Montas though with a cheap salary and 2 years left. He needs a bigger headliner prospect.
With so many teams being so cheap, a one year contract for might have more value than normal.
Bassit to Redsox for Dalbec and some lower level prospects makes some sense providing the A’s do move Chapman and or Olson.
Makes sense if the Red Sox re-sign Schwarber or are seriously in on Freeman or Rizzo. I don’t see Bloom spending big on any of them and Casas isn’t going to be ready til mid-season at the earliest. As good as Travis Shaw was off the bench late in the season i don’t think any of us want to see him re-signed to be the starting First Baseman
It is time for Oakland to blow up the steam and start again. Melvin and this group was never going to win in postseason. Olsen is a nice player but he will never reach the level of former Athletics first baseman, Jason Giambi. On in the other club, Olsen would be the number seven hitter. As for Matt Chapman, I think he is reached its peak and will never be seen in the same category with former athletic third baseman, Eric Chavez. Olson and Chapman were good but not great players. Compared to the A’s of the early 2000s these players never matched up with that group. I saw Brooks Robinson play in his latter years. Chapman reminds me of him on his way out. It is my hope that this next group will reach a higher ceiling. The way baseball is structured today I don’t see how a team can win unless they’ve got at least one or two great players on the team.
He’ll never reach Giambi’s level?? He’s there right now the only difference is Olson’s glove is much better.
Giambi was the worst defensive First Baseman in the league and the things he did offensively he did with roids so in that regard Olson is already miles ahead of Giambi.
While Chavez was a better all around hitter than Chapman, Chapman’s glove is better than Chavez
Chavez was a better “all around hitter”…really? Got any data to back that up? How about hitting against LHP?
All sports have always been structured so you need at least one or two great players on the team to win.
I feel so bad for As fans.
Me, too. They need to #firefisher.
If you constantly have to purge your roster because you can’t afford to keep the players, maybe you don’t deserve an MLB team. I’m talking to you Oakland, Arizona, Miami and Cincinnati. League would be much better off with 4 to 6 less teams.
They can afford to keep them. It would just cut into their profits and take away funds for signing other players and player development.
Oh they don’t even want to pay their manager 4 mill. Just like in Moneyball the A’s probably can’t even afford properly running vending machines.
You are incorrect. It’s not that the vending machine didn’t work but rather the team was charging the players to use them lol
Billy got Dombrowski to pay for the teams soda
If you haven’t noticed, that applies to at least 1/3’rd of the franchises in MLB.
Until there is full revenue sharing as in the NFL, this will continue.
And you are right about contracting teams – there aren’t enough quality players to staff the 30 we have now. Seasons are decided on hitters beating up on bullpen pitchers that should be in AAA. And now they want expansion…..which will not only continue to dilute the talent level, it’ll create yet more teams that will fall into the category of small market teams. Watch what happens after 4-5 years when the good feelings of having a ML team in their area wear off.
the NFL is so great! so much mediocrity and perpetually horrid teams!
Oh.
DarkSide: You forgot the mundane, cut and paste lines by the announcers – ugh, it’s horrible.
You’re absolutely right, Yankee Clipper.
That was my Troy Aikman impression.
Also, nobody seems to care much that the entire NFL is running gear.
Samuel: Full revenue sharing would hurt the sport and decrease parity. Don’t you find it odd baseball has the greatest parity when comparing professional sports, such as, MLB, NBA and NFL? And don’t you think it a tad wrong for teams to share all revenue? Hint: it is wrong, and not just because it doesn’t work.
What they need are penalties put n place for tanking repeatedly and teams not doing everything in their power to win – oh yeah, guess who said that? Billy Beane!
Why do you think Hal Steinbrenner voted to lower the CBT? Because it’s a nice thing to do to share more revenue? NO! Because caps and revenue sharing ultimately make the owners more money…..
Yankee Clipper, you think Badeball has parity. How. Houston, Boston, Yankee, Rays are in the hunt every year with Houston going to WS twice in last 3. LAD, Braves, St Lou in the NL. How many WS have Dodgers been to in last 4 years.
Since the Wild Card era every team in MLB has made the postseason. 26 teams have at least five postseason appearances with the Royals having the least with 2. 22 teams have played in the World Series and 14 teams have won championships. I would say there is a fair level of parity in the game.
Every team has to go through cycles of contention/retooling/rebuilding. Ask Ruben Amaro Jr. and the Phillies about what happens when you try to keep the same roster together longterm
Pittsburgh and Kansas City belong on that list. (Teams who can’t afford to compete year-in, year out.)
Is not their fault owners are cheap and another thing leagues grow with time they don’t get smaller. What kind of business would do that?
What other businesses provide vending machines with free food to their employees?
The Cincinnati Reds are a Baseball institution. Like it or not they will never go away. Same for the A’s. They’ve already played in 3 different cities in they’re history and i think we all see the writing on the wall that says a 4th one is coming by the end of the decade.
The unfortunate thing for teams in some places is the draw vs other things to do. Even when the Miami Heat had LeBron James, Dwayne Wade, and Chris Bosch most fans didn’t start showing up to the arena until the second half of most games. The Panthers struggle the same as do the Marlins. The Marlins attendance issues are magnified by the fact they play in a stadium meant to hold nearly 37000 while FTX Arena holds only 21000. Even if Jeter traded for Mike Trout, Mookie Betts, and Shohei Ohtani you’ll never see many sold out games at Marlins Park.
Philadelphia A’s, Kansas City A’s, Oakland A’s…some things don’t change. Cheapskate franchise.
I do miss the A’s with Wally Haas as their owner. Signed Ricky to the largest contract in the league before signing Canseco to the largest contract. Other than the Haas years, nothing but cheapskate owners with Fisher being the worst. Worth Billions and won’t field the best team he could.
John Fisher alone might be really the reason why there should be a salary floor of $150M. Just can’t trust billionaires to do the right thing by the people.
Salary floors are ridiculous. It’s a way for large market teams to force small market teams to overpay lousy players, and get their FO’s away from the innovative things they do using technology and skilled people to find inexpensive players that produce for them. It guarantees their teams will be mediocre.
This is like telling fast food franchises that they need to hire a bunch of people at $15 an hour and not use Kiosk’s and computer systems to send orders to the cooks, the packagers, and the people that hand over the food – instead they should quadruple their workforce (and slow down the service, mess up orders, and increase their already high prices).
Ain’t gonna happen.
no, it’s not. with floor or lower threshold, small market teams will retain and extend their own players with upside.
How do you know that?
And if they do, you guarantee that those players will produce at the higher salary in the future? The fact that it’s not guaranteed means that the smart FO’s WON’T do that.
It’s not like they don’t currently extend players they think will produce into the future.
#firefisher
Caps and revenue socialism, I mean “forced sharing” are absurd. Floor is the only thing that will fix it.
Why would they.
What a sad pile of dog poop.
A salary floor doesn’t force anyone to overpay anyone unless it’s set way too high.
There is nothing wrong with a $15 minimum wage. Tax payers should never have to subsidize bad business owners. Especially when they sell garbage that makes people sick and costs us again in extra medical care.
The last one is my pet peeve because it demonstrates one of the biggest failings in our educational system. Rules in society are designed to work as a package and when done in a package it’s sometimes hard to see the connection between rule and benefit. A high enough minimum wage for a full time worker to survive without food stamps and taxpayer handouts is a good thing. It should be the starting point for everything.
Adding in a “no kiosks rule” seems unfair when you mention it with another cost. But it doesn’t come with another cost. It actually funds a benefit that you’ve chosen to ignore. You guys demand the government gives you everything but you whine every time there is a cost in society. It’s just like taxation. People think they should only pay taxes based on this, that or whatever and seem to ignore the fact that none of you could even afford to build the roads you drive on.
If no Kiosks means more fast food workers and voters decide that’s how they want to structure the economy so what? If every burger at every fast food place was 25 cents more would you even notice?
Would you prefer we bump the income tax a little bit? The sales tax?
Bills don’t go away because the job you just quit wasn’t fair.
You can’t just bill everyone a few pennies every time they move either. You have to structure every financial system to cover costs. The best ways to do that are to insert them into transactions. Doing it uniformly is easy to understand but it’s better for everyone if you structure them to encourage investment in things taxpayers want and discourage things we don’t want.
Quadruple? If you think a factor of 4 is obtained by automated order transfer you’re a fool.. If you use that number because you actually know how weak your argument is then you’re a bad person.
The A’s have nine World Series titles. From time to time they do things *very* right.
The last World Series title the A’s won was in a different financial era. An era when, believe it or not, the A’s had the largest payroll in all of MLB.
The Marlins should be all over Murphy if the A’s are willing to trade him
Wow that’s truly ridiculous.. That owner whoever he is, clearly can’t afford to run a baseball franchise. Sell it to someone who can and get out the way.. 40 million dollar payroll at the moment and they’re still looking to trade their top guys, out of the fear of having to pay them.. Cause they’d be around 80-85 mill after arbitration.. Absolutely ridiculous and flat out disrespectful to A’s fans, and baseball fans in general. It’s disgusting.
Fisher is horrible
To me, this entire narrative doesn’t add up. A’s aren’t going to make 19 trades this offseason and buy cheap FAs to fill out the roster. This team is built to contend, they have a 5-man starting rotation totally in place, not many teams can say that. Then top 5 at 1B, 3B, C and arguably CF. I get the A’s are built to lose a lot of guys in FA, but that doesn’t start until after this season and next. They should just buy cheap FAs and win 97 games instead of selling.
Trade Bassitt for Vidal Brujan and sign FA’s and call it a day is what Beane & Co should do..
@ A’sfaninUK;
Maybe you ought to reread what you write – because you continuously contradict yourself.
OK. the 2021 A’s were built to CONTEND. I agree. And they DID contend for a WC spot.
How about their attendance being 29th or the 30 teams in MLB? I can’t find their TV revenues for 2021 (or anyone else’s in MLB) but I know their contract was near the bottom.
Many of their core players are due for large raises in 2022, but the revenue isn’t coming in to pay them. I wouldn’t call the owner: “Cheap”. Something like: “Rational”, “Realistic” “Not a moron” would fit.
I’m sorry to tell you this – but every national sports publication and writer I read has come to the conclusion that the A’s will be moving to Las Vegas shortly.
oh please, the A’s probably make more money than most teams, especially when you factor in revenue sharing money that goes right into ownership’s pockets.
You know that how?
Tell you what – why don’t you and all the complainers on here each purchase a dozen season tickets for A’s games starting in 2022. You don’t have to show up. You can donate them to needy people that want to attend major league games in Oakland. Each of you needs to get 100 of your friends, relatives, and acquaintances to do the same.
You have assets. You can take the money out of the bank. Sell some stocks. Take a 2nd mortgage on your property. Take out a loan.
What’s the problem?
You and your fellow complainers aren’t “CHEAP”, are you?
What a horribly dumb false equivalence. The owner of the A’s is a BILLIONAIRE.
How can SF afford players and cross the bridge to Oakland can’t.
I highly doubt the Rays are giving up one of their top prospects for an aging pitcher with really only one really good season on his resume.
Bassitt was in the top ten in Cy Young award voting in both 2020 and 2021 and had a 10 and 5 record in 2019.
If the Rays trade for him, he would likely be their best starter until Glasnow gets healthy, and might be better than him.
The narrative is a joke.
The idea that trading a great player is automatically going to hurt your team was already a stupid one but people have gone completely nuts.
I can’t promise the A’s are going to do anything good or bad but acting like any trade has to be for A ball players and that you can’t improve a major league team and reduce payroll is nuts.
Teams that wait too long to make these decisions are the ones that suffer. Everyone resets before they get a new stadium too so the only question here is timing. This is a really good year to do it for a lot of reasons.
Does anyone actually care about Oakland? Not to be a ballbuster or nothing but they haven’t even been to a world series in 30 years. It really disgusts me they had a movie made about them when they have accomplished nothing. I wish they would just close up that abomination of a stadium and move the team to Las Vegas like the Raiders did.
Sounds like the pettiest and stupidest reason to hate a team, the Indians didn’t win anything either, getting a movie made doesn’t mean “best team” lol no one ever thought this until Moneyball.
I think it all boils down to hurt Yankees fans, who took the A’s getting this movie made was a shot at them, because they barely beat the A’s in the playoffs around those times, but everyone who watched them knew the A’s were the better overall team, and the Yankees knew they got some BS plays go their way that decided the whole series but hate that this A’s team got highlighted over theirs. Weakest fanbase ever. 2001-2021 = 1 chip in 21 seasons, get over yourselves you aint special.
The best team is the one that wins.
What an awful take
Cleveland had three movies made about them. With 30 teams in MLB, all things being equal(they’re not), the average should be 1 in 30 seasons to win a WS, and 1 in 15 to play in one. Watch the end of the Moneyball, when Beane is interviewing with Boston, and you’ll be reminded of what they accomplished. There are other accomplishments than a WS (though none better).
Spoken like a loser who lives a trash ass city.
The movie comment is one of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen.
You need help if that’s true..
Wish someone could take my A’s fandom from me
You and me both. Just can’t quit it
I wish they’d find another Rickey Henderson!
How about Olson, Chapman and one of the pitchers for Dominguez?
Well, at least the Rangers won’t be last…
dream on!
Happy thanksgiving guys! Hope everyone had a nice holiday
Let’s be honest. They’re prime for the rebuild. A’s rebuild usually is not as long as others.
Trade off some of these mentioned players with rising salaries and dwindling team control for prospects.
They can even also play the “still trying” mode by taking in 1/2 year overpaid salary guys (ex. Will Myers, DiDi, etc.) with a prospect attached, to fill those holes.
Not only perfect timing in terms of their cycle but also in terms of the FA market and timing things for the next stadium.
My trade proposal for the Guardians to get Olson is this:
Bobby Bradley goes not because he has a ton of value, but because Cleveland would have no other use for him once Olson is there. Could be flipped later, or could just be their stopgap option at 1B
Nolan Jones is a top 100 prospect in baseball. It’s a steep price but Olson is worth it and as long as they have Jose he’s blocked at 3B. This, in effect, creates a two year contention window while you have Jose, Olson, and Bieber.
The third guy would be one of their middle infield prospects. Rocchio and Freeman are both top 100 prospects but with those two the price is steep, and almost nobody fetches two such prospects anymore in baseball, let alone two who would both be bear major league ready. My bet would be Jose Tena, who just won the batting title for the AFL despite being one of the youngest players there, and won a minor league gold glove (that is to say, he was considered the best defensive SS in all of the minors). He’s young and has barely gotten to AA, but he’s going to be a top 100 prospect very soon.
For the last part I could see two paths. One would be an immediate rotation piece – possibly Zach Plesac. That’s again a steep price but Olson is worth it, and Cleveland has some depth to work with. The other path would be two more minor league players. I would think Steven Kwan’s statistical profile would excite Oakland a lot, and if you combine that with a non rule V eligible prospect like Petey Halpin or Xzavion Curry.
Wow, finally a realistic trade idea.
ironically three of their best pitching prospects (and 2 they are rumoured to be shopping) were from Madison, Zobrist and Hill deals.
luzardo, manaea and montas
Wasn’t Luzardo traded for Marte at the deadline?
I really thought they had a team to contend back in April. Knowing how they operate, I knew they had to go all in this year because they were going to destroy their mlb roster this winter. Sad they didn’t even made it to the playoffs
Agreed though I think not making the playoffs made it a no brainer.
It’s one thing to add a little to a team that got close but a significant add to this team on top of the build in salary inflation was never realistic..
The handwriting on the wall in terms of what the A’s will do this winter is that fact that (correct me if I’m wrong) they haven’t interviewed anyone for their vacant managerial position. With no sense of urgency on that front, it’s clear to me that a rebuild is at hand, but it’s not clear to what extent they’re willing to go.
Take.Hinch
We’ll take Soderstromn
A’s are not going to let Ken Rosenthal tell them what they can , and can not do . Going to move as much as we can for top grade prospects . A’s don’t want your roster junk . If you don’t come correct with prospects they will hold them till the trade deadline . I expect to see the A’s get the # 4 draft pick in 2023 . Onwards to Las Vegas in 2024 .
I would fully love to leave the Yankees out in the cold on Matt Olson . We have some Padres bucks in our back pocket thanks to the Bob Melvin move . Trade Matt Olson to the Padres for Will Myers , Cj Abrams , Robert Hassell , and James Wood . Prospects , and guy who will be off the books in 2023 .
Would want nothing more then for the Yankees not to get Olson. But then what would happen with Hosmer?
DH
You sound bitter
SF sends Joey Bart and who else to OAK for Murphy?
Ramos.
Oakland wants to build a competitive ball club while penny pitching, these trades could get them into the playoffs next year:
NYY: Gleyber Torres (2B), Miguel Andujar (3B/OF), Luke Voit (1B/DH), Clarke Schmidt (SP), Brandon
Lockridge (OF)
OAK: Matt Olson (1B/DH) & Sean Manaea (SP)
NYM: JD Davis (3B/OF), Dominic Smith (1B/LF), Brett
Baty (3B/OF), Khalil Lee (OF), Jose Butto (P), Josh
Walker (P)
OAK: Frankie Montas (SP) & Matt Chapman (3B)