rmjon23
09-26-2008, 06:06 AM
A's Beane takes the blame as Angels just get better
Bruce Jenkins
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
(09-22) 17:41 PDT -- The Joe Blanton trade was only a few hours old
when this space extolled the wisdom of Billy Beane's philosophy. The
A's utter collapse seemed to follow on cue, along with a torrent of e-
mails suggesting that Beane and your columnist find some other line of
work.
Little has changed in the team's outlook as the season winds down, and
there's no doubt Beane is severely testing the patience of longtime
A's fans - even the most ardent supporters - who wouldn't mind
harboring some hope for next year. Just take a look at the Angels when
they open postseason play next week, and you'll get a sense of Beane's
desperation. He's a bright, reasonable man, but "desperate" is the
operative word when you're facing that brand of opposition.
Picture the A's in the National League West. If things had broken just
right, the A's could have won that division with Blanton, Dan Haren,
Mark Kotsay, Nick Swisher and the other recently departed players.
Forced to play the cards as dealt, the A's aren't simply facing a
consistently strong team. The Angels have become baseball's model of
excellence, surpassing the Red Sox and leaving the Yankees in a little
pile of dust.
Beane wasn't trying to hide anything. In making those deals,
harvesting nearly two dozen prospects in the bargain, he flat-out
informed his fans he was giving up on the 2008 season. The payback
couldn't have been more clear. Beane also figured to gain four or five
top-flight major-leaguers in his rebuilding plan, while restocking a
depleted farm system, and there's little evidence to suggest he was
wrong.
It's true that the A's haven't found a young pitcher of Tim Lincecum's
caliber, a collegiate draft pick with the potential of Buster Posey,
or a young hitter as captivating as Pablo Sandoval (the comparison
between Sandoval and Daric Barton, the model of Oakland's obsession
with on-base percentage, is almost comically one-sided). The Giants
just might be winning the cross-bay competition in terms of future
star power.
Still, it would take two or three columns to detail the best-case
residue of Beane's recent deals and draft choices The A's got six
prospects in the Haren deal alone, and all of them - Carlos Gonzalez,
Aaron Cunningham, Chris Carter, Brett Anderson, Dana Eveland and Greg
Smith - could be on the big-league roster by the end of next season.
What must disturb Beane is that the Angels, unlike such wildly
fluctuating entities as Detroit, Colorado or Houston, aren't going
away. They easily could be the runaway favorite in the AL West for the
next 10 years.
In terms of management, no team can match the Angels' combination of
Arte Moreno, the wealthy and beloved owner; Tony Reagins, the
aggressive general manager (and one of baseball's few African
Americans holding an upper-level job), and manager Mike Scioscia.
The Angels were dangerous enough under Bill Stoneman, the GM who
presided over the 2002 world championship team, but he didn't pull a
trading-deadline deal that even remotely compared with Reagins'
acquisition of Mark Teixeira. At a time when the White Sox and Rangers
thought they were closing in on free agent Torii Hunter last winter,
Reagins arranged to meet Hunter at a Del Taco on state highway 91,
about halfway between Riverside and Anaheim, and they hammered out a
deal with Hunter's agent on the spot.
Scioscia isn't merely the best manager in baseball - or at least among
the top three, by any measure - he orchestrates a style that, frankly,
puts Oakland's to shame. Don't dismiss the built-in advantage of the
Angels' formidable payroll, but the A's seek out players fit for a
patient, station-to-station offense that runs dry, too often, in the
absence of legitimate power. Scioscia's lineup essentially is a bunch
of maniacs who (save Teixeira) hastily put the ball in play, take
risks, look to steal bases and execute the hustling first-to-third
mentality better than any other club in the game. And that's only part
of the story. "They're just so deep," Yankees starter Andy Pettitte
said. "They've got offense, speed, great arms, everything you'd want,
and they play with a lot of confidence."
One of Scioscia's former players, White Sox shortstop Orlando Cabrera,
calls him "the smartest guy in the game right now, no doubt. This guy
dominates the opponent, the way he thinks, how he knows the
opposition. He's just on another level."
Even the Angels aren't immune to the pitfalls of player transition.
They stand to lose Francisco Rodriguez, he of the record 61 saves, to
the free-agent market. They'll surely pick up the club's option on
Vladimir Guerrero, but Teixeira - who reportedly wants a 10-year deal
- is no guarantee to stay. Then again, if you're CC Sabathia or
another star on this winter's market, what's a more attractive option
than Anaheim?
These are the grim, basic facts that keep Beane up at night. I'll
admit, I'd be plenty upset if I were an A's fan, but it would be more
about the decrepit Coliseum or the absence of a BART station at the
proposed stadium in Fremont. I don't have any problem with a radical,
unconventional thinker making the big decisions.
E-mail Bruce Jenkins at bjenkins@sfchronicle.com.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/23/SP4A132JL6.DTL
This article appeared on page C - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle
Bruce Jenkins
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
(09-22) 17:41 PDT -- The Joe Blanton trade was only a few hours old
when this space extolled the wisdom of Billy Beane's philosophy. The
A's utter collapse seemed to follow on cue, along with a torrent of e-
mails suggesting that Beane and your columnist find some other line of
work.
Little has changed in the team's outlook as the season winds down, and
there's no doubt Beane is severely testing the patience of longtime
A's fans - even the most ardent supporters - who wouldn't mind
harboring some hope for next year. Just take a look at the Angels when
they open postseason play next week, and you'll get a sense of Beane's
desperation. He's a bright, reasonable man, but "desperate" is the
operative word when you're facing that brand of opposition.
Picture the A's in the National League West. If things had broken just
right, the A's could have won that division with Blanton, Dan Haren,
Mark Kotsay, Nick Swisher and the other recently departed players.
Forced to play the cards as dealt, the A's aren't simply facing a
consistently strong team. The Angels have become baseball's model of
excellence, surpassing the Red Sox and leaving the Yankees in a little
pile of dust.
Beane wasn't trying to hide anything. In making those deals,
harvesting nearly two dozen prospects in the bargain, he flat-out
informed his fans he was giving up on the 2008 season. The payback
couldn't have been more clear. Beane also figured to gain four or five
top-flight major-leaguers in his rebuilding plan, while restocking a
depleted farm system, and there's little evidence to suggest he was
wrong.
It's true that the A's haven't found a young pitcher of Tim Lincecum's
caliber, a collegiate draft pick with the potential of Buster Posey,
or a young hitter as captivating as Pablo Sandoval (the comparison
between Sandoval and Daric Barton, the model of Oakland's obsession
with on-base percentage, is almost comically one-sided). The Giants
just might be winning the cross-bay competition in terms of future
star power.
Still, it would take two or three columns to detail the best-case
residue of Beane's recent deals and draft choices The A's got six
prospects in the Haren deal alone, and all of them - Carlos Gonzalez,
Aaron Cunningham, Chris Carter, Brett Anderson, Dana Eveland and Greg
Smith - could be on the big-league roster by the end of next season.
What must disturb Beane is that the Angels, unlike such wildly
fluctuating entities as Detroit, Colorado or Houston, aren't going
away. They easily could be the runaway favorite in the AL West for the
next 10 years.
In terms of management, no team can match the Angels' combination of
Arte Moreno, the wealthy and beloved owner; Tony Reagins, the
aggressive general manager (and one of baseball's few African
Americans holding an upper-level job), and manager Mike Scioscia.
The Angels were dangerous enough under Bill Stoneman, the GM who
presided over the 2002 world championship team, but he didn't pull a
trading-deadline deal that even remotely compared with Reagins'
acquisition of Mark Teixeira. At a time when the White Sox and Rangers
thought they were closing in on free agent Torii Hunter last winter,
Reagins arranged to meet Hunter at a Del Taco on state highway 91,
about halfway between Riverside and Anaheim, and they hammered out a
deal with Hunter's agent on the spot.
Scioscia isn't merely the best manager in baseball - or at least among
the top three, by any measure - he orchestrates a style that, frankly,
puts Oakland's to shame. Don't dismiss the built-in advantage of the
Angels' formidable payroll, but the A's seek out players fit for a
patient, station-to-station offense that runs dry, too often, in the
absence of legitimate power. Scioscia's lineup essentially is a bunch
of maniacs who (save Teixeira) hastily put the ball in play, take
risks, look to steal bases and execute the hustling first-to-third
mentality better than any other club in the game. And that's only part
of the story. "They're just so deep," Yankees starter Andy Pettitte
said. "They've got offense, speed, great arms, everything you'd want,
and they play with a lot of confidence."
One of Scioscia's former players, White Sox shortstop Orlando Cabrera,
calls him "the smartest guy in the game right now, no doubt. This guy
dominates the opponent, the way he thinks, how he knows the
opposition. He's just on another level."
Even the Angels aren't immune to the pitfalls of player transition.
They stand to lose Francisco Rodriguez, he of the record 61 saves, to
the free-agent market. They'll surely pick up the club's option on
Vladimir Guerrero, but Teixeira - who reportedly wants a 10-year deal
- is no guarantee to stay. Then again, if you're CC Sabathia or
another star on this winter's market, what's a more attractive option
than Anaheim?
These are the grim, basic facts that keep Beane up at night. I'll
admit, I'd be plenty upset if I were an A's fan, but it would be more
about the decrepit Coliseum or the absence of a BART station at the
proposed stadium in Fremont. I don't have any problem with a radical,
unconventional thinker making the big decisions.
E-mail Bruce Jenkins at bjenkins@sfchronicle.com.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/23/SP4A132JL6.DTL
This article appeared on page C - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle