Recap: It's hard to know what to make of this A's team. Should we expect the club that contended for the AL West into September? Or should we consider them to be the club that fell apart in September to the tune of an 8-23 record, not only blowing their chances at stealing the West crown but also their first winning record since 1967 (surprised it was only 3 years ago)? One thing is clear, which is that the A's pitchers packed a ton of heat: A's hurlers struck out more than 1,000 batters last year and finished 2nd in the league in that mark.
History: These A's, at least over the past couple years, were the laughingstock of the American League, and when they brought in a couple of vets to try and bolster their roster last offseason, more than a few critics rolleyed their eyes. To be fair, though, they're at a point in time where they need to make their fans believe in something: over their entire history, between Philadelphia, Kansas City, and now the Bay Area, not only have they never made the postseason, they've only been within 10 games of it 3 times. Last year was also only the 3rd time in the past decade where they'd managed to bring in more than a million fans, so perhaps those moves (plus the move to a larger market) were positives after all.
Outlook: Are these guys dark horse AL West contenders, or are they destined for another hundred loss season? Nobody really knows for certain.
Rotation
Code:
Pitching Age BT W L WL % ERA G GS GF CG SHO SV IP H R ER HR BB IBB SO WHIP H9 HR9 BB9 SO9
Shelton, Rick 29 LR 13 17 .433 3.89 35 35 0 7 1 0 247.2 219 126 107 23 141 11 180 1.454 8.0 0.8 5.1 6.5
Ortiz, Roberto 24 RR 12 10 .545 3.75 33 33 0 2 0 0 221.0 175 100 92 25 141 8 245 1.430 7.1 1.0 5.7 10.0
Barnard, Lee 26 LL 11 10 .524 3.54 27 26 0 4 0 0 180.2 183 78 71 21 59 10 106 1.339 9.1 1.0 2.9 5.3
O'Neal, Ryan 29 RR 7 7 .500 4.39 32 18 4 1 1 0 151.2 172 84 74 15 59 7 76 1.523 10.2 0.9 3.5 4.5
Lancaster, Nate 28 LL 4 6 .400 3.78 16 16 0 2 0 0 97.2 107 46 41 13 43 9 73 1.536 9.9 1.2 4.0 6.7
Harris, Mike 22 LL 5 7 .417 3.90 15 14 1 0 0 0 85.1 84 44 37 6 39 3 63 1.441 8.9 0.6 4.1 6.6
McGranahan, Chris 32 RR 4 6 .400 2.97 11 11 0 3 0 0 69.2 62 28 23 6 15 2 30 1.105 8.0 0.8 1.9 3.9
Dolezal, Nate 31 RR 1 2 .333 1.19 6 4 1 0 0 0 30.1 20 6 4 1 26 2 13 1.516 5.9 0.3 7.7 3.9
Rubio, Jose 30 RL 0 0 .000 5.40 8 4 0 0 0 0 16.2 29 11 10 4 7 4 7 2.160 15.7 2.2 3.8 3.8
Rick Shelton led the team in games started, innings pitched, and complete games, but is less of a true ace than a guy the A's trot out there every 5 days to keep them in games. Like a lot of A's starters, he can be on the wild side: he led the league in wild pitches and tied with teammate
Roberto Ortiz for the lead in walks. That said, his fastball hits the low 90s and he pairs it with a slider that seems like it's only gotten better since he was rescued off the scrap heap in the expansion draft last year by the Pilots. Ortiz is their #2 although he has the electric stuff that could see him turn into a legitimate #1. For now, the lack of control and youth have prevented him from getting that far into games.
Lee "Batty" Barnard had himself a good 2nd season in the rotation and has established himself as the "control" starter for the A's and the lefty who prevents teams from piling in with too many left-handed batters during a series against this young pitching staff.
It's hard to say at this point what the back of the rotation will look like.
Mike Harris had a nice second half in the majors following an 11-4, 3.04 first half in AAA Iowa and looks like he might have the inside track at the #4 starter slot. The fact that he failed to complete a single game in the majors is slightly alarming. Two Nates -
Nate Lancaster and
Nate Dolezal - could compete for the final slot, assuming the A's go with 5 men to open the year. Dolezal's 30 innings pitched last year were, frankly, smoke and mirrors, but he did get results. The main argument against Lancaster would be that the back end of the rotation is loaded with left-handers.
Bullpen
Code:
Pitching Age BT W L WL % ERA G GS GF CG SHO SV IP H R ER HR BB IBB SO WHIP H9 HR9 BB9 SO9
Ramirez, Carlos 27 SR 3 7 .300 2.99 61 0 46 0 0 22 87.1 79 34 29 11 22 1 80 1.156 8.1 1.1 2.3 8.2
McCourt, Aaron 32 RR 3 2 .600 2.53 50 0 20 0 0 2 67.2 57 24 19 4 28 7 44 1.256 7.6 0.5 3.7 5.9
Howard, Josh 27 RR 3 4 .429 4.26 43 0 17 0 0 2 61.1 53 30 29 11 21 2 62 1.207 7.8 1.6 3.1 9.1
Uscanga, Freddy 24 LL 4 3 .571 2.97 27 0 24 0 0 6 33.1 29 18 11 3 19 3 21 1.440 7.8 0.8 5.1 5.7
Duckett, Jake 25 LL 3 0 1.000 1.44 27 0 11 0 0 0 31.1 20 5 5 0 13 1 39 1.053 5.7 0.0 3.7 11.2
Weickert, Danny 36 LL 2 2 .500 4.78 23 0 11 0 0 0 32.0 45 21 17 0 19 2 26 2.000 12.7 0.0 5.3 7.3
Cheeseman, Adam 36 RR 2 0 1.000 6.89 14 0 1 0 0 0 15.2 20 12 12 2 11 2 7 1.979 11.5 1.1 6.3 4.0
Allen, Chris 26 RL 0 0 .000 0.79 8 0 3 0 0 0 11.1 10 1 1 0 4 0 3 1.235 7.9 0.0 3.2 2.4
Tudor, Andy 28 LL 0 1 .000 6.75 2 1 0 0 0 0 8.0 6 7 6 0 10 1 3 2.000 6.8 0.0 11.3 3.4
Yost, Neil 24 RR 0 0 .000 7.71 4 0 2 0 0 0 4.2 5 4 4 1 1 0 3 1.286 9.6 1.9 1.9 5.8
With
Carlos Ramirez gone to Pittsburgh - he was traded in September for OF prospect Elijah Wright -
Josh Howard is tabbed as the team's primary closer. His basic stats indicated he struggled last year but the Athletics are more impressed by his 100% save rate (2/2 but still) and the fact that he allowed exactly zero of 12 runners to score. Maybe he just needed to be placed in higher leverage positions.
Jake Duckett had such a good year as a lefty specialist that there's a really strong chance that he'll enter 1971 as a co-stopper, in fact. He throws 90MPH heat and combines it with a split-fingered fastball that falls off the plate. As a result, hitters have collected just 1 HR off of him over the past two seasons and last year he struck out 11 men per 9 innings. Pretty good! If you can call anyone a "primary" middle reliever, that would be
Aaron McCourt, who the A's purchased for cheap from the Cardinals last winter. McCourt had suffered through a rough 1969 but in Oakland he seemed to find new life on his curveball and raised his K rate by about 50%.
Catcher
Code:
Batting Age BT G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS DP BA OBP SLG Pos
Escobar, Jonathan 28 RR 126 437 49 111 19 0 10 61 64 97 0 0 16 .254 .345 .366 2*
Culliton, Jeff 27 LR 93 156 9 35 4 0 0 11 8 21 0 0 8 .224 .263 .250 2
Malone, Sean 27 RR 14 28 7 8 3 0 0 5 10 9 0 0 1 .286 .474 .393 2
Jonathan Escobar followed up his 1969 Gold Glove award by throwing out 41% of opposing runners. If he doesn't repeat, I'll be surprised. He also rebounded from a rough year at the plate where he hit just .235 and, probably more importantly, hit zero HRs all season long to put in a very strong, nearly Silver Slugger caliber season. Somehow he was snubbed from the All-Star team. There was something of a Picture of Dorian Grey situation with backup
Jeff Culliton. Culliton had been a rare bright spot with the bat on a bad '69 team and was expected to spell escobar against tough righties and also be the team's primary pinch-hitter. Escobar took the starting job fairly quickly and while the team continued to use him in the latter role, the results were very, very bad: he was just 9 for 62, all 9 of those hits singles, pinch-hitting. On top of it all, Culliton does not have many friends in the clubhouse, to put it mildly.
Infield
Code:
Batting Age BT G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS DP BA OBP SLG Pos
Decker, David 42 RR 123 473 80 136 25 0 28 80 55 55 2 0 16 .288 .366 .518 3*
Lewis, Josh 22 SR 26 96 5 19 1 0 0 4 6 15 0 0 1 .198 .240 .208 3/2
Moore, Chris 30 RR 90 364 41 83 18 2 11 42 31 74 1 1 14 .228 .288 .379 4
Potter, Rich 27 RR 70 284 26 63 9 1 0 17 17 19 3 0 6 .222 .272 .261 46
Molina, Ruben 23 RR 29 108 7 26 9 2 0 13 7 22 2 0 3 .241 .291 .361 4
Jones, Chase 28 RR 117 445 56 107 20 3 17 69 57 98 2 1 11 .240 .325 .413 5*
Vallin, Jose 36 RR 39 134 17 35 3 3 4 14 12 21 2 3 1 .261 .318 .418 53
Beall, Preston 35 RR 12 12 0 4 0 0 0 3 1 1 0 0 0 .333 .400 .333 /5
Evenson, Matt 24 RR 71 224 24 49 10 0 3 12 32 50 0 1 10 .219 .312 .304 6
Wilson, Gil 28 LR 75 230 12 55 5 0 3 20 21 40 0 0 9 .239 .299 .300 65/4
Owen, Kellen 29 RR 80 154 19 50 12 0 2 18 13 19 0 0 3 .325 .375 .442 65/43
David Decker was limited to just 6 games and 21 at-bats in September due to complaints of blurred vision. With its veteran leader - perhaps not a captain, but Decker's the kind of guy who leads quietly and by example - out, the team struggled terribly. They attempted to use catcher prospect
Josh Lewis at the first sack in his place but all the 1st overall pick in the 1969 draft did was raise new questions. The A's hope - pray, perhaps - that that bad month was just gerowing pains for Lewis, who did hit .362/13/62 to earn the call-up. It should be pointed out, too, that Decker had a very nice rebound season last year - his 28 HRs were his highest total since 1966 - but you can't expect a 42 year old to maintain that. It's far more likely that he drops back to the .239/13/61 level that he had 2 years ago, or, if that seems overly pessimistic, the .257/9/59 in 366 at-bats with Philadelphia in 1969.
Chris Moore had just about the most out-of-sync All Star nod I've ever seen. He was acquired from Houston's organization in June, where he'd been hitting .342 for Oklahoma City, and then hit well enough in 30+ games from there that the American League saw fit to name him as an injury replacement. He got to keep the 2B job the rest of the way and absolutely plummeted, hitting .165 in August and .219 in September. I'm as perplexed as anyone here. He'll go into 1971 fighting it out at the position with
Rich Potter, whose own .223 mark as of the end of May is what led the A's to seek out a pennant-race replacement, ahd
Ruben Molina, who hit .347 in AAA himself last season and, unlike Moore, is an actual prospect.
Before
Chase Jones missed the final month of the 1970 campaign with a herniated disc in his back, he had been doing pretty much exactly what he'd done in Houston the previous season - a middling average, mid to high teens in power, a fair amount of clutch hitting, and steady if unspectacular play at third base. If fans were disappointed that he never hit the way he'd hit in two stints between 1967 and 1968 (.325 and .335 respectively), they were probably asking too much, or else they were just sore over the way longtime A's third sacker Ryan Colvin was treated (to be fair, though, it's not like Oakland fans had a long time to get to love Colvin). Just in case Jones gets hurt again, the A's have 36 year old former Mets guy
Jose Vallin available.
The A's ended the year with 24 year old
Matt Evenson as the shortstop. He may have shown just enough to break spring training as the starter, although he'll certainly be pushed by
Gil Wilson. Wilson might be the better fielder of the two but not by much. He's also proven to be a guy who hits an empty .240 whereas Evenson had a combined 26 extra-base hits last year between Oakland and AAA Iowa (where he hit .267/0/22 with 11 doubles and 2 triples in 165 at-bats). For him, cutting down on strikeouts will be a big factor.
Outfield
Code:
Batting Age BT G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS DP BA OBP SLG Pos
Levario, Matthew 37 SR 146 542 84 129 15 2 24 71 88 99 3 1 11 .238 .344 .406 7*
Bueno, Raul 32 RR 64 112 8 24 4 2 1 14 2 10 5 7 2 .214 .224 .313 7/34
Harbison, Jonathan 29 SR 8 8 2 3 0 0 0 0 2 1 0 0 0 .375 .500 .375 /78
Schurke, Mike 23 SR 138 521 52 151 26 5 7 50 38 38 13 13 15 .290 .340 .399 8*/9
Vallejo, Alex 27 LL 50 200 21 59 9 0 1 21 16 21 8 2 5 .295 .347 .355 89
Harrison, Jeremy 24 RR 18 38 9 10 0 2 3 6 7 11 3 0 1 .263 .378 .605 /897
Dockery, Dylan 27 RR 5 6 1 3 0 0 1 4 2 0 0 0 0 .500 .625 1.000 /8
Berman, Richard 24 RR 57 229 31 68 9 3 2 23 25 11 5 1 2 .297 .372 .389 9
Marsden, John 27 LL 53 215 30 74 8 0 7 18 26 21 0 1 6 .344 .413 .479 9
Henricks, Jordan 30 RR 82 205 17 46 6 2 0 13 17 31 3 1 9 .224 .285 .273 93
Along with Decker,
Matt Levario was the other old man the A's brought in to balance the lineup prior to this year. For him, the results were more mixed: he failed to hit as well as he had in Atlanta (.270/28/81), although to be fair he also went from one of the best hitter's parks in the game to one of the worst. He did set the table as the cleanup hitter a lot with 88 walks; it's not really his fault that the team didn't have a lot going for it past the two old folks.
Mike Schurke hit all over the lineup except for the position he might be best qualified to fill, which is the leadoff slot. Schurke is one of those guys who's constantly looking for an edge and sometimes that leads to unnecessary outs on the basepaths. Sometimes, too, it leads to heady, aggressive rallies, and his sparkplug nature is a big part of why the team was so competitive in the first half. Nobody was more upset when everything fell apart in September; Schurke reportedly went so far as to get into a shouting match with C Jeff Culliton when the latter failed to run out a ground-ball on one of his many failed pinch at-bats. The A's also have
Alex Vallejo, a former All-Star who was the victim of a numbers game with the Cubs last year, who has to start somewhere. Moving Schurke because he's unhappy with the clubhouse seems like a thing bad teams do but then, Vallejo has to get into the lineup somewhere.
The A's expect the 24 year old
Richard Berman, acquired from the Brewers for John Marsden and pitcher Chris McGranahan in June, to be a top right fielder for years to come. We're not convinced. He doesn't have the power you want in a corner OFer and while he's got a decent arm, he lacks the instincts and consistency you'd want from a good fielder. What Berman does do is hit. He got on everyone's radar by hitting .372 for AAA Portland in 1969 and in spite of being tasked with figuring a whole new set of pitchers out last year, he hit a combined .306 between Milwaukee and Oakland. He struck out just 17 times in 447 at-bats; this was not some fluke of BABIP.