State of the Team for September 10, 2009 (plus some other stuff)

Wow, six days since my last post, that's definitely a record for the brief history of Les' A's. Anyway, to get down to business...I still haven't finished my top prospects article. It's taking longer than I expected because there's quite a bit to write about all of them. Today the A's have an off day and are traveling to Minneapolis for take on the Twins. Hopefully it's not the most enjoyable of days off in the Twins Cities since so many opportunities were blown in the game to the White Sox last night. I was really pushing for them yesterday because a win last night would have been the first time the A's had won more than three in a row since they won 7 straight back in June. With that said, it's a mild testament to the team that they have not lost more than 3 in a row since June either.

Coming up this weekend in the A's and Twins series will be Clay Mortensen vs Nick Blackburn, Brett Anderson and Jeff Manship, and Gio Gonzalez vs Brian Duensing . Nothing here truely screams Cy vs Cy but it will be nice to see Orlando Cabrera again, plus the Twins are still trying to hang in the race for the AL Central. There a ways back but they have quite a few head to head match ups with the Tigers down the stretch that could make or break them.

I read the quote from an anonymous scout regarding the Hairston trade on a couple of websites. Apparently he said the A's "got smoked" on the trade. It's odd this guy is probably paid pretty well by a major league team who takes his opinions of talent evaluation very seriously. I'm not saying the A's did better than the Padres, but I'd say it was a fairly even trade. Maybe Gallagher was a bit much to throw in but the guy has an ERA near 6 in his MLB career. Ryan Webb could be a decent reliever, but he's probably going to average 50-70 innings at best, which isn't enough to put this trade over the top for San Diego. Craig Italiano throws 95 MPH...WHO CARES. His career minor league ERA is 5 with a WHIP of nearly 1.6. The only thing impressive about him was going 7-0 at Kane Kounty with a 1.16 ERA until he was promoted to Stockton and that ERA promptly ballooned to 9.90 Scott Hairston's been a part time player his entire MLB career while posting a .764 OPS over that time (that's .013 above the 2009 MLB average) . Now if this scout thinks Gallagher is something special because of his success in the minors, then it would only be fair to point out what Hairstons in the minors too: .320/ .400/ .568 in over 1800 AB's. Yeah he's 29 but there's always potential for development when somebody becomes an everyday player for the first time.

After a tremendous amount of success in the minor leagues for the Diamondbacks, as well as success off the bench for the San Diego Padres, Scott Hairston is a starting outfielder for the first time.

So the River Cats, Rock Hounds, and Cougars all made the playoffs...last night each playing game 1 of their first round match ups. The Cats and Hounds got W's while Kane County took the loss. Interesting points from each game...Kenneth Smalley, the organization leader in ERA through much of the year, gave up 6 runs in 1.1 IP, while Tyler Ladendorf (player received for Orlando Cabrera) went 2/4 with a double in Kane County's 12-7 loss to the Burlington Bees. Midland took down the San Antonio Missions in 11 innings as Graham Godfrey, combined with the bullpen, held the Missions to just 2 hits until Josh Donaldson drove in the Hounds lone run in the top of the 11th. The River Cats beat the Tacoma Rainiers (Triple A affiliate of the M's) to the tune of an 8-2 final. Both Brett Wallace and Chris Carter connected for home runs while Adrian Cardenas was on base 3 times (scoring twice) and Tommy Everidge pounded out 3 hits with 3 RBI.

Well that's about it....oh yeah, I hate the AM/PM commercial on the MLB web sites before the team highlights play. Comments?