A’s Notes: Coliseum, Wood, Spence

The Athletics are set to meet with the African American Sports & Entertainment Group next week to discussing selling their 50% stake in the Oakland Coliseum, reports Mick Akers of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The city currently owns the other 50% of the Coliseum complex. Oakland’s AASEG also offered to purchase a stake in the Coliseum last year but were rebuffed, Akers adds.

A’s fans will want to check out the report for full details, but the A’s could sell off their share of the Coliseum complex entirely, with the AASEG looking to develop potential sites for expansion franchises in the NFL and WNBA. Akers adds that the A’s are “open” to sharing the Coliseum with the Oakland Roots and Oakland Soul soccer clubs and selling their share of the facility if it can facilitate an agreement wherein the city of Oakland allows the club to extend its lease at the Coliseum from 2025-27 — the interim years between the current lease expiration (at the end of 2024) and the planned opening of their new Las Vegas ballpark.

Turning to the team itself, the ’24 Athletics will feature a largely revamped rotation. The team’s hope had been that an aggressive fire sale of talents like Matt Olson, Matt Chapman, Chris Bassitt, Sean Manaea, Sean Murphy and others would create a base of controllable young talent around which to build. That hasn’t played out. Most of the young pitchers acquired thus far in the rebuild have failed to progress. That led the front office to look outside the organization, signing Alex Wood to a one-year deal worth $8.5MM and swinging a trade to acquire Wood’s former Giants teammate, Ross Stripling.

Wood spoke with John Shea of the San Francisco Chronicle about both his excitement to be back into a full-time starting role and some frustration with the manner in which the Giants handled last year’s staff. Wood made three starts to begin the season, briefly landed on the injured list, and was surprised to be asked to pitch in relief upon returning.

“When I came back [from the injured list] four weeks later, it was like, ‘Hey can you throw an inning out of the bullpen against Arizona Friday, and we’ll start you on Monday in Philly?’” Wood explained. “It was from the beginning of the year we were doing stuff like that. It definitely wasn’t the easiest thing.”

The Giants used 13 starting pitchers in 2023, but that included a handful of relievers who were regularly used as openers. Ryan Walker, Scott Alexander (also an Athletic now) and John Brebbia were the most frequent openers for a Giants club that deployed that tactic a whopping 35 times in 2023 despite rostering several veteran rotation pieces. Wood, Stripling, Sean Manaea and Jakob Junis have all worked as starters in the past but were used in similar hybrid roles in ’23, with the results ranging from pedestrian to sub-par. Finding a more stable rotation role was a priority in free agency, Wood told Shea.

Further down the rotation pecking order is right-hander Mitch Spence, the top pick in December’s Rule 5 Draft. Spence, selected out of the Yankees organization, is in camp with the A’s competing for a spot on the roster, ideally in the rotation. But with four spots spoken for — Wood, Stripling, Paul Blackburn and JP Sears — securing a spot is a tall order. Manager Mark Kotsay spoke highly of Spence in chatting with Martin Gallegos of MLB.com, however, and suggested that there could be a long relief role available for Spence even if he doesn’t seize a spot on the starting staff.

“He’s going to compete for a rotation spot,” said Kotsay of Spence, “and we’ll probably entertain looking at a long role for him if the rotation doesn’t make sense or if he doesn’t make it.”

The 25-year-old Spence paced all minor league pitchers with 163 innings over the course of 29 starts in 2023. He posted a 4.47 ERA with the Yankees’ top affiliate in Scranton, fanning 21.8% of his opponents against a sharp 7.3% walk rate. Spence notched an already impressive 50% ground-ball rate last season, but he tells Gallegos he’s also working to incorporate a sinker into his repertoire this spring, in an effort to up that grounder rate even further. Kotsay likened Spence to his new teammate, Blackburn, noting that he’s not overpowering and is more location-focused while praising his ability to pitch inside.

If Spence doesn’t make Oakland’s roster, he’ll need to be exposed to waivers and, if he clears, offered back to the Yankees for a nominal sum of $50K. So far, the right-hander has made just one appearance in camp, pitching two innings and allowing a run on three hits with no walks and three punchouts. Spence will compete with names like Luis Medina, Joe Boyle, Joey Estes, Adrian Martinez, Freddy Tarnok, Kyle Muller and Osvaldo Bido for either a rotation or swingman spot with the A’s.