"Redd" is Golden

It had been 27 years since Dwayne Murphy was a Gold Glove outfielder for the Green and Gold. Josh Reddick got in on the Au action for the Athletics when he was named the American League's Gold Glove right fielder Tuesday. No, it wasn't a World Series ring, and no Gold Glove pennant will fly at the Coliseum in 2013. But it was a nice sign of respect for a franchise that at least from a local standpoint gets snubbed by the national media. Of course, the American League's managers and coaches voted Reddick over other RF finalists Jeff Francoeur and Shin-Soo Choo, so continue your "East Coast Media" tantrums directed at the ESPN, Sports Illustrated and Gotham area journalists who seemingly have their own favorites. This was a nice bit of street cred for Reddick and the A's, who also placed third baseman Brandon Inge as a finalist at third base (Texas' Adrian Beltre won the award, and Inge will test free agency). Fans can also vote Reddick for the best of the best Platinum Glove award here.

Reddick needs to work on getting more productive at-bats with situational hitting, particularly with runners in scoring position (.206; .203 with two outs) and cutting down on his 156 strikeouts in 611 at-bats. But for his legitimate season as an everyday player, Reddick's defense more than made up for his occasional struggles at the plate (and he still smacked 32 homers with 85 RBI). The A's look very solid on defense in the outfield if Chris Young ultimately ends up as the center fielder, and Yoenis Cespedes got more and comfortable in left as the season dragged on.

The other significant news Thursday was far more bittersweet: pitchers Joey Devine and Dallas Braden elected elected to become free agents after they cleared waivers and were outrighted to Triple-A Sacramento. Neither Braden nor Devine has found much good fortune lately.  Devine underwent his second Tommy John surgery in 2012 after the same operation cost him the 2009 and 2010 seasons. It's a shame since the hard-throwing right-hander has been an effective reliever when healthy. 

As for Braden, A's fans will never forget his Mother's Day 2010 perfect game with his grandmother in the stands and Braden's late mother looking on from a higher place.  It was one of the most special days in Oakland since the 2002 20-game winning streak, and if Braden signs elsewhere he endeared himself to the fans for a lot more than just throwing what was at the time the 19th perfecto in Major-League history, and Section 209 at the Coliseum will always be a special corner with a Stockton flavor. Braden was a YouTube sensation again this season, but it had more to do with Stockton's crime problems and his disappointment with his beloved hometown than baseball. 

Here's wishing good health and a 2013 spring training success story for both Devine and Braden. 

A quick look into 2013

Update: The Athletics will not exercise the option on Stephen Drew for 2013 (let the speculation begin on what that means for both Drew and the A's and if they agree to a multi-year deal). And Grant Balfour will be back next season as the team's "raging" closer. 


Well, this blog is not surprised the Giants defeated the Tigers to win the World Series, since that was our pick. But a sweep? Two consecutive shutouts after a Game 1 wipeout of Tigers' ace Justin Verlander, who seemed like he had this on his mind rather than this? It did seem a long time ago Verlander was making the A's hitters look like Little Leaguers in stuffing Oakland's own World Series hopes.

Congratulations to a dominant seven-game stretch of victories over the Cardinals and Tigers by the team on that side of the bridge. And a special thanks to injured/inactive/no factor in 2012 pitcher Brian Wilson, who's the Will Rogers of Bay Area sports personalities: he's never met a camera he didn't like, or want to interact with, even while shut down.
Back to the Athletics. Jane Lee, Oakland's beat writer for MLB.com, reported on the A's expected quiet offseason. I don't expect general manager Billy Beane to ever be quiet between Halloween and Groundhog Day, but we'll see if the 2013 A's look much like they did in 2012.

As Lee reported, shortstop looks like the most uncertain spot on the diamond with Stephen Drew and the A's both needing to agree to the former's $10 million 2013 option to kick in. I'm not sure Drew is a great fit, even for one season. He had a few big moments after his trade from Arizona on Aug. 12. But his season in green and gold ended with a thud, getting thrown out at third, arguably unnecessarily and recklessly, that for a moment snuffed out Oakland's chances of evening its ALDS series with the Tigers (the A's went on to win Game 4 in typically taut fashion). He then fanned four times in four at-bats off Verlander in Game 5.
Of course neither of those performances were grounds for jettisoning Drew and sniffing around elsewhere for a shortstop. But for a team that doesn't spend much money, $10 million represents a lot of Colossal Dogs for a player who just doesn't look like he's an elite player anymore as he suggested early on in Arizona. Then again, Beane traded Cliff Pennington, who would be at worst a respectable option at shortstop had Drew either on his own or via the A's turning him down bolted for free agency.

So you have no choice but conclude Beane is confident 1. Drew wants to come back to the A's; 2. Drew will be not just a solid defender but a productive hitter for a team that candidly needs to be more consistent with plate discipline; and 3. Drew can anchor the infield and presumably mentor second baseman Jemile Weeks, as 2013 will be a huge and critical opportunity for him to dismiss his disappointing year as a sophomore slump and nothing more.

And it's safe to say most A's fans look forward to, with fingers crossed, the heart of the club -corner outfielders Josh Reddick and Yoenis Cespedes (I do believe another quality and proven bat could be added to protect those guys, and it's debatable if Chris Young is that bat); starting pitchers Brett Anderson, Jarrod Parker, Tommy Milone; relievers Ryan Cook, Sean Doolittle and Grant Balfour; and manager Bob Melvin, to be fixtures in Oakland for years to come. It's time for the front office to give Athletics' fans players to root for and wear their uniform numbers on their jerseys without the risk of losing them to the tired cycle of "building for the future trades" and bringing talented but nameless prospects in return.

November pain

When I look into your eyes I can see a love restrained
But darlin' when I hold you, don't you know I feel the same? yeah
Nothin' lasts forever and we both know hearts can change
And it's hard to hold a candle in the cold November rain


"November Rain", by Guns N' Roses


It looks like the NHL lockout is going to last forever, or at least until Commissioner Gary Bettman can't let an NHL Winter Classic, before 100,000 red-clad fans and a Greek taverna's worth of octopi ready to be chucked onto the Michigan Stadium grass, get away from his grasp.

For now, another 326 regular season games though November were slashed and burned Friday.

The Sharks' Web site quickly has adjusted to the switch. And as far as Team Teal is concerned, the latest season opener would take place on Dec. 1 in Detroit. Can't wait to not see Brad Stuart suit up for his new former team against his most recent former team. Looking forward to not figuring out how the Red Wings' defense will skate without Nick Lidstrom anchoring the blueline while instead he will be enjoying a beautiful winter day in Sweden. Stoked to not anticipate how the Sharks' lines -only the top trio of Patrick Marleau, Joe Thornton and Joe Pavelski seems like it's set out of necessity- will stack up and get an early test for San Jose's presumed new and improved penalty kill with new assistant coach Larry Robinson expected to toughen up the boys.

Nope. I don't expect the Sharks to be skating in Joe Louis Arena on Dec. 1. Axl Rose convinced me otherwise. 

Hey Bud, Let's Party..... In Oakland? San Jose?

If any other team was playing in the World Series, Bud Selig's latest spin cycle known as the Athletics' quest to relocate to San Jose would have been somewhat big news (though there is never actually news when Selig talks about the Oakland-San Francisco-San Jose love triangle).

So here was Major-League Baseball's head honcho once again technically saying something but really saying nothing about the A's and their new stadium soap opera prior to Game 2 of the World Series Thursday night in San Francisco. Heck, if the Bay Area media wasn't the dominant representation during Selig's expected bayside chat and he was meeting the press in St. Louis, he probably would have barely been required to speak about the A's and Giants territorial tug-of-war for Silicon Valley, because the St. Louis Post Dispatch and Detroit Free Press couldn't care less.

Selig spewed out terms like "very productive" (in terms of progress made) and "complex" (with regards to the red tape he'd have to wade through to find a solution). But as the San Francisco Chronicle's Susan Slusser reported, Selig was also nonchalant about the idea this issue will have a resolution before Lew Wolff's former Wisconsin Badger fraternity brother (insert Douglas C. Neidermeyer joke here if you like) before he's scheduled for retirement at the end of the 2014 season.

"I don't feel any pressure. The only thing that will guide me ultimately on every issue is what I think is in the best interest of baseball."

Fair enough, and even fair enough on not feeling any pressure jazz. The A's got by more than OK in 2012 with their less than tony crib. The fans even showed up at the end of the season, filling up the old house and looking like a rabid baseball market again. Surely that impressed the commish enough to make sure A's fans get what they and their team deserves and frankly desperately needs: A baseball-only home in the Bay Area, conveniently located with plenty of parking and with access to public transportation. (Wait, the Oakland Coliseum parking lot already provides some of that and maybe the Raiders will.... oh, never mind). 
And his Greek brother Lew should have felt like, "Well, as long as I can -even on the cheap- throw out a competitive, exciting, gregarious and ultimately playoff-participating team, Oakland can indeed be a place where baseball thrives again. Maybe we shouldn't give up on building a stadium here."

But in reality Lew offered a no comment on Thursday. So.......

World Series prediction

The A's are gone, but not forgotten (sort of).

This is the time of year that media outlets both love and hate at the same time: one of the teams you cover has made it to a championship round. In one instance it's a great opportunity to showcase your newspaper or Web site and fill it with preview material, feature stories, analysis, human interest stuff, general nonsense. But these moments are also abhorred by those same folks because it's chaos too.
I've covered three College World Series, two in Razorback-mad Arkansas, when myself and our co-beat writer were run ragged in the days leading up to the CWS. Our editor was relentless: "Do this story, do that story. Can we get this in? How about this graph? What kind of pictures can you set up?" It's frantic, it's stressful, it mostly sucks. The actual games are cathartic because it's the only time when your boss can't hound you, much, because the game is playing and you have to, like, cover the game.

So it's no surprise that the A's are being dragged to this San Francisco party by the scribes and talking heads of the Bay Area looking for fresh material and schtick. But the Athletics are barely the Giants' plus one in this bash; more like the nerdy friend who can break into his or her parents' liquor cabinet and sneak some whiskey out of the house and add something crazy. There's been so much hoopla with the Giants -and it's tough to deny its justification- it feels more like six months rather than two weeks ago the Athletics were sharing the October spotlight. Now they are just a convenient space-filling sidebar for the team that pushed Detroit to the limit in the American League Division series, while the big, bad Yankees died like dogs in the championship series.
Hey Tigers: you guys played in Oakland and praised the crowd noise? Expecting that from the AT&T Park campers?
What say you, Brandon Moss? You faced -and lost to- Justin Verlander and the Tigers twice. How do you see the Giants faring against him?
And BoMel, Derek Norris and Tommy Milone: how good are these Tigers? What's the recipe for beating these cats? Or almost beating them like you guys?

OK, to the pick. Really quick parallel is I'm thinking 2007. The Colorado Rockies were the hottest team in baseball. They stormed to a 14-1 finish, including a one-game playoff win over San Diego. Colorado swept Philadelphia and Arizona in two playoff series, and if you're counting at home that's 20 wins in 21 games, 2002 Athletics-ish. Then the Rockies waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. Nine days from the end of the NLCS until Game 1 of the World Series. The Boston Red Sox had to scrap and claw from 3-1 down in the ALCS against Cleveland. And what a comeback, Boston outscoring the Indians 30-5 in Games 5, 6 and 7 to win. Then after just two days rest, weary Boston routed rested Colorado in a four-game sweep.

Things are a little less dramatic this time around. The Tigers will have only been off for five days since finishing off the Yankees, and the Rockies' World Series Game 1 starter in 2007 was Jeff Francis. And he was not Verlander, who gets the ball tonight in Game 1 and gives the Tigers a great shot to get out to a quick lead (you know, like Cincinnati and St. Louis did on the road in San Francisco). But the Giants' situation was very similar to the Ought-seven Sox. The Giants, even with a lot of new faces, are just a couple years removed from a World Series title (Boston won in 2004, S.F. in 2010). Like the Red Sox, the Giants dominated the last three games of the NLCS rallying from a 3-1 series deficit.
And here's another bad omen for the Tigers, and unfortunately it ties the Athletics to this historical tidbit:

And this little fact: Three times in the past, the World Series has matched a team that went to Game 7 in the LCS against a club that swept its series. In all three instances, the team coming off a Game 7 win breezed to the championship.Boston swept Colorado in 2007, St. Louis chased Detroit in five games in 2006  and Orel Hershiser and the Dodgers beat Oakland in five games in 1988.

But baseball trends have been thrown out the window by the Giants in the playoffs, so the Tigers' dominant starting pitching, Verlander possibly being able to throw three times, and the potential of big bats like Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder breaking out against the Giants' somewhat inconsistent rotation gives Detroit a decent shot. But I can't see it, and it's not so much from crunching sabermetrics or questioning the Tigers' shaky bullpen or expecting Verlander to hit a rough stretch or Bruce Bochy out thinking Jim Leyland in the dugout.

The destiny darling Giants may as well call Hollywood producers while the iron is hot and pitch a script for a sequel to "Unstoppable". This is an orange and black Caltrain commuter without a conductor in the engine car running wild up the Peninsula. Said choo-choo is doomed to run over the Tigers at the end of the line at the Fourth Street station a couple blocks from AT&T Park. In the last round, character actors like Marco Scutaro and Barry Zito stole the screen time for the Giants. But the A-listers like Buster Posey and Matt Cain could channel their inner Denzel Washington and Chris Pine for this flick.

Being objective as I can possibly be in this difficult time for Oakland A's fans: Here. Goes. Nothing.

Giants in Six.

Scoot's stats are insane

Since he was traded by the Colorado Rockies to the San Francisco Giants on July 27, former Athletics' infielder Marco Scutaro, 36, has played 73 games with 271 at-bats spanning the regular season and playoffs. He's driven in 49 runs. In four seasons with the A's from 2004-07 Scutaro never appeared in less than 104 games and never had fewer than 379 at-bats. Yet during that span from ages 28-31 Scutaro's Oakland RBI total never reached as high as 43 (in 2004 with 455 at-bats when at 28 was in theory just entering his prime).

That statistical information can be digested two ways:

1. As a baseball fan and admirer of a gamer like Scutaro, you appreciate that a supposed "valuable utility player", unheralded veteran and clearly a late bloomer can carry a team all the way back from the brink of elimination (the Giants as a team did it twice in separate series and won six elimination games) to the World Series, Scutaro's first.

2. As an A's fan, you shake your head at how such improbability can occur this late in a career and when it doesn't elevate your favorite team!

The Giants, Justin Verlander and the Detroit Tigers' dominant starting rotation be damned, have to be the favorite to win the World Series if fate means anything and if Scutaro's remarkable stretch is destined for anything but the highest level of greatness.

Giants catcher Buster Posey should win the National League Most Valuable Player award and if so it should not questioned because he was that good from Opening Day to Fan Appreciation Day. But Scutaro's NLCS MVP honors won following the Giants' Game 7 coronation from 3-1 down to St. Louis to a laughable rout of Games 5, 6 and 7 might as well cover three months. Posey drove in 42 runs combined in August, September and October heading into the playoffs. But he's supposed to do that as an MVP candidate and one of the faces of the franchise. Scutaro had the same number of RBI during that time, batted .402 in September and hit .500 (14-of-28, three doubles and four RBI) in the championship series. It insults the term unsung hero. The likely NL MVP against St. Louis? A svelte .154 (4-of-30 with no extra-base hits and all of one RBI).

Granted, Scutaro's been good all year even pre-San Francisco; 2012 saw the Venezuelan record career-highs in RBI (74), batting average (.306, his first .300 season), hits (190) and games played (156). But consider that Scutaro played the first 95 games of 2012 with the Rockies, 54 in the light-aired, hitter's paradise known as Coors Field. Not surprisingly, he performed very well in Denver (.320/.379/.434, 27 RBI, .812 OPS in 219 at-bats).  But consider Scutaro's regular-season numbers in the sea-level, heavy air of AT&T Park: 33 games and 125 at-bats, 2 home runs, 20 RBI, .352/.399/.488 with an .887 OPS.

Scutaro is Exhibit A why baseball can dump at the side of the road logic, common sense and sanity. You can't possibly explain it and if you try to nobody will believe you, but you can't deny it either.

Tommy Boy

Sharks' forward Tommy Wingels is one of the team's most promising young players and could help compensate for what looks like a very thin minor-league system. But during the NHL lockout Wingels got himself into hot water for his new team in Finland. As a member of one of the coolest team names in hockey, KooKoo Kouvola of the second-tier Finnish Mestis League, Wingels delivered a vicious hit: see the video in the linked Comcast SportsNet Bay Area story above.

Wingels received a three-game suspension for his hit, that frankly looked a little questionable at first glance. Collisions like that make you feel a little nervous for Sharks' players who are scattered around various European pro teams. Rangers' winger Rick Nash, Joe Thornton's teammate and buddy on the Swiss team Davos, suffered what was deemed a not overly serious shoulder injury last month.

In with the Young....

Leave it to Oakland general manager Billy Beane to shake things up already. The A's dealt middle infield regular Cliff Pennington and a prospect Saturday. It shouldn't be a surprise the Diamondbacks were the trading partner. Beane must have a radar station somewhere near Flagstaff honing in on Chase Field down the mountain in Phoenix. Oakland received outfielder Chris Young from the Snakes. He seems like a perfect fit for this club: a decent baserunner with power who strikes out a lot.

As it stands now, the deal apparently didn't cost the A's an extraordinary bounty, unless 22-year-old Single-A outfielder Yordy Cabrera, a .232 hitter in the offensive-friendly California League in 2012, turns out to be a late bloomer (and it won't be with Arizona, who quickly sent him to Miami to obtain reliever Heath Bell). Pennington is a gamer and he filled in nicely at second at the end of the season when Jemile Weeks' struggles lost him his job and the arrival of Stephen Drew from -wait for it, Arizona- took over Pennington's usual shortstop position. But Pennington is replaceable, particularly if as the above linked story by the San Francisco Chronicle's Susan Slusser suggested Drew returns to the A's for 2013.

The interesting angle with this trade is if Young was acquired to be the new center fielder. There's no way Beane would break up his corner outfielders Josh Reddick or Yoenis Cespedes, right? Center fielder Coco Crisp and his $7 million price tag for next season could be more expendable despite his veteran presence; underrated pop; speed as a leadoff hitter; ability to leap tall fences in a single bound and rob Prince Fielder of playoff home runs; and his status as one of the instigators of prompting Terry Kiser of "Weekend at Bernie's" fame to become one of the Athletics' new No. 1 fans and spawning a new pastime in the Coliseum stands. 

At first glance, I'd rather keep Crisp in center and look for help elsewhere if it meant Young, who does play a solid defensive center field himself, was going to replace him. But Slusser's followup this afternoon cited Beane's desire to not move any of his outfielders. What does that mean for Young? A right-handed hitting DH to split time with Seth Smith as I first thought and Slusser hinted at in her report? Replacing clubhouse mentor Jonny Gomes as the fourth outfielder? A HGTV-style flip to another zip code?

The way Beane shrewdly put together the 2012 roster with the so far outstanding trade return for pitchers Gio Gonzalez, Trevor Cahill and Andrew Bailey, A's fans should be willing to trust his judgement for now. Young hit 130 big-league home runs and stole 110 bases in his first six full seasons and sports a .755 career OPS (not bad overall numbers for a center fielder). Hey, this move gives A's fans something to talk about while the team that knocked out their team in the playoffs waits in the World Series and their cross-bay rivals try to make another improbable postseason comeback.

Props to 75

You won't find this blog openly rooting for that other team across the Bay frequently. Translated: never, which is obviously why there is enough frozen-over ice in hell today to host pickup hockey for locked out players if they choose to make the trip way down. So admittedly, I was happy for Barry Zito after his fantastic performance in Friday's Game 5 of the National League Championship Series in St. Louis.

A quick primer on this: I once chatted up and got to know Barry Zito, about as well enough as you can with a pen in one hand and tape recorder in another. When I was working as a sports reporter in L.A. I wrote an extensive feature story on Zito previewing his start in the now infamous Game 3 of the ALDS vs. the Yankees in 2001. It was one my favorite pieces I've ever written on a pro player. During my interviews, I enjoyed meeting Barry's parents, Joe and Roberta, who were both wonderfully candid (I was so saddened to read of Roberta's passing in 2008. When I talked to her for that story she'd already endured plenty of health issues.). 
Joe and I kept in touch for a long time via e-mail, and he even asked Barry for me to hook up myself and a buddy with some comp tickets when the A's played in Kansas City while Zito was still with the Athletics. Barry was how I expected him to be as an interviewee: cordial and accessible, but a deep thinker. I was much more pleased how the story turned out than the game (I drove up from L.A. to watch with some friends, and like all A's fans still refuse to understand nor accept why Jeremy Giambi didn't bother to slide).

Zito left Oakland for an absurd $126 million contract, so while he was one of my favorite Athletics, I understood even the cheapskate Oakland front office shouldn't have blinked in letting him walk away for that kind of dough. Sure enough, the left-hander has never come remotely close to justifying the amount, and when thinking about the Big Three of Zito, Mark Mulder and Tim Hudson, the A's fan base can look back and only feel bitter about the terrible return Oakland received from Atlanta for Hudson, clearly the best of that trio. Mulder, who got the A's a lot more back from St. Louis, is now out of baseball. And Zito must have been one of the game's richest non-playoff roster players ever when his current team won the World Series in 2010.

But it's weird, while I have less than zero rooting interest for the local team in the NLCS, whatever part of my blood that seeps out green and gold felt some satisfaction for Zito ironically keeping his team's season alive. Good for him to throw 7 2/3 scoreless last night, and though I find it difficult to ever feel sorry for someone near the end of a nine-figure contract and sporting a .457 winning percentage as a pitcher during that time, the guy's been hammered by his team's fans, the local and national media. Of course now he is an orange savior, a viral # and sudden fast friend to all scribes and talking heads rather than punching bag.

As an objective journalist who enjoyed the experience getting to know Barry Zito on a professional level, the A's fan in me who appreciates his 102 wins in an Oakland uniform salutes him for what he did in St. Louis.

In case you're planning your social calls around hockey games....

The NHL shocked us all (not really) and and banged more hockey games through Nov. 1. Honestly, I haven't been paying attention to which specific games the Sharks have lost. But the four latest to get banged this time were particularly distressing since all four leaked some intrigue from  them. It wasn't as if the Sharks were losing blah games against Colorado, Edmonton, Carolina: Sorry, already canceled etc.

These four were all interesting in terms of rivalry, quality of opponent, subplot or all of the above:


*At Detroit, Friday, Oct. 26 
*At Chicago, Saturday, Oct. 27
*vs. Nashville, Tuesday, Oct. 30
*vs. St. Louis, Thursday, Nov. 1.


The sense -hope?- here is there will be hockey played before the Times Square Apple drops on as Dec. 31 turns to Jan. 1 or shortly thereafter. But with the ketchup bottle-slow rate the negotiations will finally be poured out and resolved, it's doubtful this latest series of canceled matchups will be reincarnated. 

Swish-a-licious?

With the New York Yankees' historical American League Championship sweep -first time since the Bronx Bombers got torpedoed by George Brett in 1980- at the expense of the Detroit Tigers, it should make for a somewhat intriguing possibility involving one-time A's fan-favorite Nick Swisher. The 31-year-old Swisher will head into the offseason as a free agent and might not be re-signed. 

The Yankees, because New York refuses to accept that its beloved ball team should get smothered offensively by any pitching staff as the Tigers' did, are sure to make at least some changes to the lineup. And Swisher's expiring contract, plus his clutch hitting status as "choke-meister general" for his lack of career RISP production in the playoffs, makes it convenient to jettison the 31-year-old.

Which brings us to a long shot scenario but worthy of a Friday morning thought: Could the A's make a play to bring back Swisher to the fold with his original organization? I guess it comes down to whether Lew Wolff or John Fisher are willing to increase the payroll with the intent to capitalize on Oakland's unexpected Western Division title and the fans' reinvigorated love affair for Easy Bay baseball.

Then again, perhaps the A's, if they do throw around more green for the Green and Gold, would be wiser to spend it elsewhere than for another outfielder. Swisher, who's averaged 26 home runs and 83 RBI in his eight full big-league seasons, would not dramatically be an upgrade over the combination of defense and power (Josh Reddick in right), speed and veteran presence (Coco Crisp in center) and emerging superstar talent (Yoenis Cespedes in left) that gives the A's a solid outfield. However, Swisher can play first base, and despite a nice platoon delivered in 2012 by Brandon Moss and Chris Carter (combined 37 homers and 91 RBI), you wonder if that duo could duplicate the long-range consistency at the plate Swisher has delivered in his career.

Still, the A's have a more pressing concern at other positions than the corner outfield and first base. At least Moss and to a lesser extent Carter showed they are capable of being productive, and it's difficult to to object if Billy Beane decides to go in that direction again for 2013. Shortstop arguably remains the biggest question mark with Stephen Drew, who was solid but hardly spectacular after his stretch drive arrival from Arizona, likely to swim in free-agent waters despite having a mutual option to return available. Jemile Weeks lost his second base starting job and regressed significantly from his dazzling rookie debut in 2011, but could win the job again by default if Cliff Pennington must go back to shortstop and replace Drew. And while catcher Derek Norris has promise, he has a lot to prove in terms of being a 130-game big-league starter after at times struggling mightily offensively and letting the Tigers run wild against him in Game 5 of the ALDS.

Which brings us back to Swisher. I don't see it happening. The way teams are overspending to sign free agents, Swisher will likely cash in somewhere with deep-pocketed and less frugal teams. And given the cavalcade of boos raining down on Swisher whenever he came to bat in Oakland this season, Athletics' fans have moved on and would probably prefer if there is money to spend, use it up the middle of the diamond than at the edges.

Plus, Swisher is too Hollywood and Broadway for the East Bay these days, "Moneyball" and Terry Kiser of "Bernie" fame appearances aside. And maybe the Joanna Garcia Swisher curse is not to be dismissed. Another year, another canceled television show in season one for Mrs. Nick.

In all seriousness, and maybe it's not serious this is even a possibility anyway, but the A's should pass on making a play for Swisher.

Still bickering, still stubborn

Well, the National Hockey League Players' Association is digging in and won't say "OK" that quickly to the league's owners and its commissioner. The NHL made its proposal- and I won't get into the details of what the offer is since frankly there's so much money involved one way or the other it's too far out of my realm of reality to even comprehend.

But I will say I no longer am concerned about whether or not there is a full 82-game schedule, and this seems rather selfish, arrogant and disingenuous to me, was at least the theory behind the league's proposal to the NHLPA earlier this week to salvage an entire regular season, and unfortunately not met with a lot of enthusiasm when the two sides exchanged pleasantries yelled at each other Thursday.

So on we go with no hockey. I understand there is a lot of money at stake for both owners and players, nor do I think either side should cave in rather than stand by what they believe in. But it's time to meet in the middle, folks. Time to realize you owners and you players are not going to get everything that you want. In real life we rarely get everything we want, and in many instances we take a beating to get by. Let's hope sometime soon compromise, not complicated, becomes the defining description of Lockout 2012-13. Because with every grumpy quote from Donald Fehr and Gary Bettman it turns back the clock to the Lockout and Freeze Out Tour of 2004-05.

The wet stuff

With rain falling in both St. Louis and Detroit and delaying the two league championship series, something silly hit me considering this blog is focusing mostly on baseball and hockey.

Why does hockey, an indoor sport now but whose earliest origins saw the game played outdoors on frozen-solid ponds, end its season when the late-spring conditions are normally gorgeous throughout North America and begs people to want to be outside rather than jamming into arenas in June?

Contrast that with baseball, an outdoor staple for spectators that screams summer and hot weather, finishes its season in brutally cold late fall October conditions, usually culminating with the World Series hosting several games in the frigid Midwest or Northeast.

I realize I'm not the first genius who's thought of this. But who cares? Welcome to Ironyville.

Tigers team to beat?

Unless they screw it up by letting the Yankees off the hook in the American League Championship Series and this thing somehow goes the distance, the Detroit Tigers are setting themselves up as a difficult test for whoever survives the National League Championship series.

So much was brought up about the A's ruining the Tigers' pitching rotation when they forced a Game 5 of the ALDS because Justin Verlander was only going to be able to pitch Game 3 and a potential Game 7 against the Yankees. When the Tigers won both games in New York, Verlander had the chance to all but bury New York when the series shifted to Detroit. Verlander did, and when was the last time a pitcher has been this dominant in a team's first eight games of the playoffs?

His performance is magnified even larger given his somewhat mediocre playoffs (of course he also beat the A's in the 2006 ALCS) and World Series performance in years past, and the pressure he faced in Game 5 against the A's when the Tigers were on the verge of what would have been as far as this blog is concerned a deliciously epic Detroit collapse and comeback by the Athletics.

Looking back now, the A's had little chance against an in-the-zone Verlander, and barring a drastic funk, the Yankees' A-Rod and Swish-less lineup was quiet off him, and neither San Francisco nor St. Louis appear to have the bats to have much World Series success either. Verlander did allow a solo home run in the top of the ninth Tuesday to the Yankees' Eduardo Nunez before turning over the ball to Detroit's embattled bullpen (Phil Coke survived two base hits to get the final two outs and save a 2-1 victory and a commanding 3-0 series lead). But Verlander has been disgustingly good in three postseason starts: 24 1/3 innings, all of 10 hits and two earned runs allowed. Verlander's outing Tuesday also dispelled the notion he's just a power pitching getting by on the strikeout. He had just three (with no walks) in his 8 1/3 innings and mixing in both ground ball outs (eight) and fly balls (14).

If the Tigers can finish off a Yankees' team that seems to be in disarray in the next two games, the Tigers could get Verlander three starts in the World Series in Games 1, 4 and 7. Wishing you the best of luck with that, Giants or Cardinals.

Boyler Spoiler

As far as hockey players go, they don't get much more outspoken passionate than Sharks blueliner Dan Boyle. Let's face reality: The Sharks, whether there's a hockey season or not, have some major question marks when/if the season begins. Dan Boyle is not one of them. Sure, he's scored an playoff OT winner.... for the wrong team and he's susceptible to some other giveaways in his own zone. But the Sharks will desperately need not just his ability to shoot from the point and score on the power play, but a team that fairly or unfairly gets questioned for a lack of heart gets plenty of inspiration from Boyle.

He's also reaching that point in his career where another possibility of a canceled season is just too much for a 36-year-old to accept. Perhaps Detroit defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom knew what was coming when he hung up his skates at the end of last season. At 42 and despite 20 years of NHL wear and tear on the Swede's body, Lidstrom was still playing at a high level when the future Hall of Famer said no to extending his great career. It's possible Lidstrom didn't want to risk committing to play another season and then have to wait for his fellow greedy players and greedy owners to iron out their vast differences. Lidstrom seems content, lockout or not, which brings us back to the not so content Boyle.

Say what you want about Boyle losing a step, and perhaps losing his role as the team's No. 1 offensive defenseman (it could be you, Brent Burns). But the guy's a winner, a previous Stanley Cup hoister in Tampa and an Olympic Gold Medalist for Team Canada along with Sharks' current and previous teammates Joe Thornton, Patrick Marleau and Dany Heatley. But Boyle seems to understand that the longer this latest lockout drags on, the more difficult it will be for a player of his age to win another Cup.

That's where the lockout and the possibility the NHL will somehow bang another entire season is devastating for players getting up there in age. Imagine how Shane Doan, like Boyle 36 now, is feeling about losing games and maybe another season after he finally agreed to stay in Phoenix as the Coyotes finally looked like a team capable of serious contention after reaching the Western Conference Finals. Unlike Boyle, Doan's never reached the pinnacle of hockey glory, neither has 35-year-old Jarome Iginla or 39-year-old Daniel Alfredsson, like Doan among the classiest and most respected players in the NHL.

So they must have even more of a sense of urgency to say "Game On" than even the emotion Boyle is clearly letting out right now as the lockout drags toward Halloween.

Detroit Rock (New York) City

Wow, who was expecting that? The Tigers, fresh off their grueling five-game series win over the Athletics, having to go to the Bronx and start the American League Championship Series without starting their money pitcher, somehow survived another ninth-inning meltdown by now embattled closer Jose Valverde to win Game 1. Then a Then a sparkling start by Annibal Sanchez combined with a horribly blown call paved the way for Sunday's 3-0 victory.

Now comes the really good news for the Tigers: Justin Verlander gets a chance to torment Yankees' fans the way he broke the collective hearts of Athletics Nation when he starts Game 3 at Comerica Park Tuesday with an opportunity to go up 3-0 in the series. Factor in the Yankees losing their heartbeat in Derek Jeter due to his season-ending broken ankle, and the deliciously melodramatic and over-analyzed Alex Rodriguez soap opera, and you wonder if Detroit could possibly blow this opportunity to reach the World Series.

Not that it matters now, as baseball isn't like football where there are the dreaded "quality losses", but with every successive Detroit win it at least justifies its ALDS escape against the Athletics. There was nothing to be ashamed of at all for the A's regardless, but if the Tigers take care of the Yankees in five games or even less the way the series is evolving into (but never count out the Yankees, even a Jeter-less Yankees, just because they're the damn Yankees), Oakland's players and staff can take pride they pushed Detroit to the brink.

Missing Hockey

I'm selfish. Essentially for this blog, baseball season is over. There is no hockey season. Here at Teal&Green Sports, we have no choice but, at least for today, share some geeky reminiscing about happier days for the locked out Sharks:

An Oakland lifeline?

Having attended these two A's games in the past two weeks -at top: the regular-season finale and American League West clincher; bottom: the final Athletics' stand in Game 5 of the American League Division Series- both atmospheres were among the most spirited and loud baseball games I've ever attended. That they happened in the same season where I was at a few Coliseum game nights with thousands of empty seats says a lot about not just fans reaching out for that lightning in a bottle this team concocted, but it also suggests how much this fan base wants to reach out and support the Athletics. Bandwagon, late to the party or not, these folks were willing to and made the Coliseum/Oakland an intimidating venue for visiting teams.

A friend and Giants fan texted me the day after the season ended: "Maybe this will save baseball in Oakland". I thought that too as Game 5 wore on and seconds after the final out when the "Let's Go Oakland" chants drowned out the ridiculous boos directed toward the Detroit players celebrating on the diamond.

Check out these quotes from Tigers' center fielder Austin Jackson and pitcher Justin Verlander, whose team basically was in command the entire length of Game 5 of Detroit's 6-0 win Thursday:

Q.  Could you sense as the game wore on, you took a 2‑0 lead and you were shutting the A's down, that the Coliseum crowd was becoming less and less of a factor, and that was a big deal for them.  Could you tell there was a difference tonight?

AUSTIN JACKSON:  Not really.  It seemed like every pitch, every play, they were into the game.  And it was fun.  It was definitely a competitive game.  And when the crowd is into it like that it just makes the game better.  You feed off the crowd.  You feed off the energy.  And we were fortunate enough to kind of quiet them down a couple of times.

JUSTIN VERLANDER:  I think playing here was the toughest I've ever played in.  I know Texas was tough last year.  These fans were unbelievable.  They were on their feet from out 1 to out 27.  And we got some good fans at home, too.  But they made it tough to come here and play.  And that's what home field is all about.

Of course, it's easy for those guys to be complimentary of the crowd: their team won and is moving onto the American League Championship series against the New York Yankees. But I believe Jackson and Verlander were being honest and candid. They easily could have used the standard player-speak of "We scored two runs early and [Verlander] was so locked in from the first inning and took them out of the game. We were never bothered by the crowd." But I was there and even as it became apparent the A's were toast, the fans tried to will their team back into the game and stayed engaged. They were loud, they were proud. They were uniquely Oakland.

Hey, I'm grew up on and currently live again on the Peninsula (unfortunately, clearly Giants' country. Yes Larry Baer, I live where the Giants have without a doubt territorial rights in San Mateo County. Happy?). As long as the Athletics remain in the Bay Area if they built a stadium in San Jose, Fremont, Sonoma, or on the slopes of Mount Diablo -beats Mount Davis right?- I'd be there watching the A's play. But it wouldn't be the same without the ballpark having an Oakland zip code. The Town will probably lose the Warriors (that's an argument for a different day, as Joe Lacob and Peter Guber disgusted me with that long-range vision to flee the East Bay. How about get to the playoffs first, fellas?), and who knows what the Raiders even in the post Al Davis era are capable of doing?

A strictly baseball-only facility in Oakland -Jack London Square or somewhere near the water- would  give the city that spawned four World Series titles, Rollie, Reggie, Billy, Rickey, Stewie, Carney, Miggy, Huddy, and now The Bernie, a new home of its own. Think the first time in almost 50 years a palace for Oakland civic pride and hope for a better future for your beaten down Town.

Unfortunately, that whimper I just heard was Lew Wolff crying poor, From Oct. 7: 

MLB.com: Is Oakland a dead issue?

Wolff: We don't have any real options to build a new stadium there.

And that's going to be an issue and the black hats fitted on Wolff's and John Fisher's heads for the foreseeable future no matter how many times their baseball team gets sellout crowds and calls to remove the tarp at the Coliseum.

Game five dives

Here's the good news, Athletics' fans: Your team has been to the playoffs six times between 2000-2012. Those accomplishments would make fans in Pittsburgh, Kansas City and Toronto green (or gold?) with envy. But having watched the A's playoff teams continually shrivel up in division series Game 5's over the years has made October baseball cruel and unforgiving in Oakland.

First things first, Athletics fans had no reason to feel cheated or ashamed with what happened in Game 5 Thursday night. Fortunately, as the game ended and a quick chorus of boos came down when Detroit players burst from the dugout and on the diamond to celebrate its clinching win, most of the crowd of 36,393 -see my picture of one of many "happy" Coliseum moments above- remained standing. For a good few minutes the crowd remained to salute, cheer and chant for a wonderfully surprising club that not only exceeded but smashed the barrier of low expectations. And given how Wednesday's Game 4 ended with such momentum in one clubhouse and dumbfounded shock in the other, it's not a stretch to claim the A's probably would have beaten any other Tigers' starting pitcher if somehow their rotation wasn't set up to throw Justin Verlander, who was not going to lose Game 5 provided his team managed some run support (he got more than he needed).

Still, the A's have played in five Game 5's in the ALDS and are 0-for-5, four of those at the Coliseum. Thankfully, Oakland's division series win over Minnesota in 2006 didn't require five games since it was a sweep. Otherwise the snakebit A's probably would have lost that series too had the Twins gotten into a decisive game. 

Yes, Game 5 is the Athletics' Wimbledon to Ivan Lendl, the Super Bowl to the Buffalo Bills; wide right to Bobby Bowden; Gettysburg to Robert E. Lee. There's always that one nemesis that defines you no matter how much good you do elsewhere. And it's up to the 2013 A's to disprove if this season was nothing more than a flukey alignment of the planets, a one-year wonder and a quick return to also-ran status behind the unlimited spending Rangers and Angels.

The only salvation for the A's is Thursday night's final out was more a footnote than a foot in your mouth. There was no heartbreak, unlike in 2000 vs. the Yankees, 2001 at the Yankees, 2002 vs. the Twins, 2003 vs. the Red Sox. The A's had the tying run at the plate in 2000; blew a 2-0 lead both in the series and in the fifth game in the Bronx; somehow wasted the 20-game winning streak and a 2-games-to-1 series lead against the heavy underdog Twins; and made some of the worst baserunning blunders in baseball history during a meltdown from two games up to the Red Sox.

For the Athletics, the Fifth Game Amendment still reads like this: No Oakland baseball fan shall expect his or her team to survive a five-game division series without creating drama, tension and anticipation for a do-die game, only to fall painfully short with everything at stake. 

End of the line

Just back from what was a festive O.Co Coliseum even in defeat. Still, a disheartening end to a heartwarming season even the most optimistic A's supporter could never dream of expecting. Still, the end of a season this special hurts, particularly when the rivals from across the Bay did come all the way back from 0-2 down to advance and will now take over the Bay Area's attention. Again. But the Giants deserve a lot of credit. So do the Athletics, but it's just staggering to comprehend it can be over as quickly as it unfolded.

To quickly assess the Game 5 obit, the A's essentially had no chance to win this American League Division Series' final act the way Detroit ace Justin Verlander dominated, conquered, fooled, controlled -add your own verbiage at any time- smothered, toyed with and deflated Oakland's hitters. The Tigers needed that first run, the other five were simply afterthoughts.

More tomorrow. It's been quite a ride. But the ride has come to a complete stop, check your seats for any personal items and head for the nearest exit.

Destiny, or Det-stiny?

Now things are clear; there is no more margin for error on one side, or taking it one elimination game at a time on the other. Like the last time teams from Detroit and the Bay Area played a deciding game after one team seemed on the verge of a spirited comeback after falling behind way behind, we take you now to Game 5 of what has sprouted into a thrilling American League Division Series. The Detroit Tigers won the first two games in Michigan; the A's won the next two games in the East Bay, buoyed by a remarkable -or for this team routine?- comeback from a 3-1 deficit in the ninth inning to play yet another night.

Since I brought up the Sharks-Red Wings and their epic 2011 Western Conference semifinal when the Sharks somehow got up from the standing eight count Detroit inflicted after taking Games 4, 5 and 6 following a 3-0 deficit to win the seventh game at H.P. Pavilion, your guess is as good as mine who wins the decisive Game 5 at the O.Co Coliseum.

Sure, the biased fan in me says there's no way the Athletics and their 36,000-plus secret service muscle in the home stands don't finish off this comeback in grand style. I do believe momentum can carry baseball teams to great feats. And the A's have all of it now. How could Detroit bounce back from what happened in the ninth inning Wednesday? If any franchise understands that letting a commanding lead in a five-game series gets away in a hurry, it's the Athletics, who represent fifty percent of baseball's five-game division series that were booted by teams winning the first two games and losing the next three. Baseball karma says the A's are owed some payback.

But the Baseball Gods also must fess up for creating this guy, a confident, borderline cocky, golden-armed meal ticket the Tigers hope will salvage their pride and advancement to the ALCS. Yes, as we all thought could happen in this series, Justin Verlander looms for the Athletics' hitters in a winner-take-all matchup, and candidly until Wednesday's remarkable surge in the ninth, Oakland batters were at the mercy of the Tigers' pitching carousel over the first eight.
Detroit manager Jim Leyland believes in the idea your starter goes 100 or so pitches, then you utilize the bullpen in the late innings. But the way the A's lit up closer Jose Valverde last night, you have to think Verlander will go all Greg Focker on his skipper when he asks to take the baseball away if his pitch count soars.

With both teams struggling to score runs, common sense suggests this shapes up as a low-scoring pitchers' duel (so expect the unexpected and a 10-9 type score!). But A's starter Jarrod Parker must match Verlander if the latter is on his game. The A's need to work the count whenever possible as in Game 1 when Verlander couldn't go the distance and dig into the Tigers' bullpen when it matters most. But Oakland also needs to make something happen against Verlander. Ditto Detroit's bats must wake up and some score runs off Parker. Of course, the A's trump card is they have the last at-bat. Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder still haven't broken out, with apologies to Fielder's mammoth solo home run Wednesday. So keep an eye on how Parker attacks Detroit's sluggers early in the game. Bob Melvin will use his relievers when he needs to, and much of the last few weeks when the A's had to win his bullpen has dazzled.

Cheers, A's fans and enjoy what will be win or lose a special night.

Street Survivors

I'll keep it brief because this team has made me speechless. I'm comfortable enough to admit I thought the magic that's turned the Coliseum into David Copperfield's hat had disappeared. Wrong. The A's pulled their 15th walk-off rabbit out of that hat Wednesday night. By forcing a fifth game in the American League Division Series, it gave everyone one more night of summer even if felt more like St. Louis, Cincinnati, or dare I say, Detroit? Cold weather, light rain falling, the A's cheating death when it appeared the Detroit Tigers would finally put away gritty little Oakland's dream season.

No need to recap anything, just cherish that there's an opportunity to finish off this comeback. I'll be there, as I rolled the dice and bought a couple of Game 5 tickets just in case there would be a Game 5. Until then, but maybe an afternoon rant before what should be another electric atmosphere in Oakland.

Can AJ be OK?

You get the feeling the Athletics now feel like they will come all the way back against the Detroit Tigers and win this American League Division Series after falling down 0-2 and fumbling away what should have been a Game 2 win. But you know deep down despite all the chatter: "Hey, we've won three do or die home games against a quality opponent just a week ago" mumbo jumbo, even the brash, too young to feel any pressure Athletics understood how difficult sweeping Games 3, 4 and 5 against Detroit remained. It carries the kind of degree of difficulty that would make Olympic diving champions cringe on the platform.

What I see in the task still confronting the A's starts with the idea that so far, both Miguel Cabrera's and Prince Fielder's balls in play have not left -thanks in part to Coco Crisp's wall climbing- either Comerica Park or O.Co Coliseum; nor do either have an RBI  yet covering three games and a combined 24 at-bats. Moreover, as pointed out by Detroit Free Press columnist Drew Sharp, just one of the Tigers' eight total runs scored in the series came via a base hit (Alex Avila's solo home run in Game 1). That's a testament to how solid Oakland has pitched in this series, particularly starters Jarrod Parker, Tommy Milone and Brett Anderson, who combined have thrown 18 2/3 innings and allowed just three earned runs. But it begs the question: Can A.J. Griffin keep up this pace and stymie Detroit's bats a little more?

I don't know the answer to that question. Nor do I hearken to even take a guess about it. I do know Cabrera and Fielder will frighten every one of what expects to be another full house of screaming A's fans. And Griffin will have to keep the Detroit offense at bay again while the Athletics' lineup, which isn't exactly teeing off on the Tigers' pitching staff either, must deal with the equally enigmatic Max Scherzer given the hard-throwing right-hander's injury concerns and relative lack of work down the stretch (though that hardly bothered Brett Anderson in Game 3).

There is some added pressure on the Tigers to finish off the A's tonight. But the Tigers still have their Get Out of Oakland Free Card -Justin Verlander in a Game 5- in manager Jim Leyland's back pocket to play should the A's even the series tonight. As the final regular-season game against Texas showed, the A's can win tonight even if A.J. Griffin gets knocked out early and his team falls behind, but the Tigers' offense has nowhere to go but improve what has been a sickly attack so far. Either way, the Coliseum will be at a frenzy again at first pitch tonight, and that alone gives Griffin and the Athletics a shot to get even and create a winner-take-all deciding game. That would be a hoot, wouldn't it? 

Small step, another big one to make

Well, that couldn't have worked out better for the A's in an elimination game scenario. The question mark starting pitcher is brilliant and gives his team the most ideal setup it could have wanted: a lead going into the seventh inning. The three most important relievers cloned what they accomplished in the signature final series of the regular season, a scoreless inning each with little doubt and crowd-inciting intensity. Couple the mound work with just enough offensive production, two fantastic defensive plays, and suddenly, the A's sent the Detroit Tigers a message they won't give in this easily after a 2-0 win that frankly was a must-do for psyches and ulcers considering the Oakland franchise was working on a six-game playoff losing streak, all versus Detroit.

Brett Anderson made his case for ensuring he'll be the team's No. 1 starter for 2013 and beyond with six flawless innings. And the three-headed monster of Ryan Cook, Sean Doolittle and Grant Balfour show signs of being a modern-day version of a trio of relievers that broke the hearts of A's fans 22 fall classics ago.

But don't get the wrong idea: Detroit is still in command of this best-of-5 series. The Tigers' margin for error remains intact and have to think they'll fare better at the plate than Tuesday's four hits and 11 strikeouts. Prince Fielder alone has to believe he'll have some balls fall in Game 4 after he was robbed twice of potential game-changing hits, once by Coco Crisp, again by Yoenis Cespedes.

And A's fans have to feel a little nervous with A.J. Griffin taking the mound in Game 4 after he was ineffective and made an early exit in the regular-season finale before his teammates threw him a lifeline with a spirited comeback. Still, the A's made sure this series is indeed a series. More tomorrow before Game 4. Tonight, feel comforted that the Athletics understood what they had to do and extended the season by at least one more game.
Oakland may yet lose this series. But this bunch is not going to make Detroit feel like it's an easy path to the American League Championship Series.

Game 3 target goals

The A's understand there won't be a tomorrow to look forward to by the time they take the field a little after six on Tuesday night down 2-0 in the best-of-five. So if the Detroit-Oakland American League Division Series is to reach a Game 4 on Wednesday, the A's would be wise to reach, surpass or go under the following numbers, or they may be enduring another Detroit sweep in a playoff series.

 6
Innings pitched by Brett Anderson

This may be too much for Anderson, who provided he's not scratched, will be, according to the San Francisco Chronicle's fine beat writer Susan Slusser, coming back from an oblique injury sooner than expected with just about three weeks removed from being shut down. But given that the A's bullpen showed some leaks in Sunday's still so disappointing 5-4 loss, if Anderson can get through the sixth, it would be a good sign the Athletics are in position to win the game and extend the season at least another game.

2 
Home runs hit by Athletics

Due to the aforementioned mediocre as a whole lineup, the A's best hope to get back in the series is the long ball. Provided someone is on base when the homers are hit, hitting at least two balls out of the Coliseum would give Oakland a good opportunity to win the game.

5
No more than 5 strikeouts against Detroit starter Anibal Sanchez

The A's need to turn off the fans that seem to be blowing them back into the dugout whiffing against Detroit starting pitchers: 11 K's vs. Justin Verlander in seven innings in Game 1: eight strikeouts  in seven innings against Doug Fister in the second game. The lineup has to do a better job of making contact and force Detroit's infielders to make plays. Sanchez had -gulp- 167 strikeouts in the regular season and has to be salivating after his predecessors Verlander and Fister used the strikeout as a weapon in Games 1 and 2.

3 

Hits by Yoenis Cespedes

We saw what Cespedes on the bases can mean for the A's in Sunday's game. The Athletics' offense is simply not that great, and they need the best hitter in that lineup to be taking good swings and getting on base, preferably courtesy extra-base hits. 

3
Total stolen bases by Athletics

Much of reaching this goal is a byproduct of the A's achieving the two previous standards. Cespedes, Coco Crisp and Cliff Pennington all need to not only reach base but try and steal some bases when they have an opportunity. Outside of Cespedes' two steals in the eighth inning of the second game, the A's have not attempted another steal and need to be more daring and desperate with no margin for error remaining.

0
Runs allowed by the Athletics' bullpen

One of the team's strengths during its run to the American League West title must get the job done and shut down the Tigers in the late innings, or kiss the season good-bye.

Sloppy baseball won't cut it

This is what it's like to suffer through a Comerican Horror Story Sunday afternoon in downtown Detroit.

Simply put, the A's aren't playing the kind of championship or even series-winning baseball that defines October. Sure, the Athletics did get about as much from another rookie starter (Tommy Milone) as they could possibly ask for. They got a brilliant piece of baserunning from Yoenis Cespedes that helped the team take their final lead of Game 2 when Cespedes stole two bases, including a risky run to third that was a major gamble but the kind of gutsy call the A's needed on a day when they suffered self-inflicted wounds galore. And who would have predicted light-hitting Cliff Pennington to be his club's most productive hitter in the first two games?

None of those gold stars couldn't prevent the black asterisks that filled the box score in a 5-4 loss and desperation efforts needed to win games 3-4-5 to avoid having this fantastic season end. To make it short and sweet, these moments were devastating and the A's mostly have themselves to blame for them:

*Coco Crisp now knows how Josh Hamilton feels. Both center fielders must cope with botched fly balls that could be among the biggest gaffes that helped end their team's seasons. Crisp had no business dropping Miguel Cabrera's sinking fly ball that admittedly he had to cover a lot of ground to catch with two outs and two on in the seventh with the A's hoping to hold onto a 3-2 lead. He was still there in plenty of time to make the play. And if you're going to try and make a basket catch Willie Mays style, at least make sure you can laugh about your manager chewing you out in the dugout. Dropping the ball deserves more than a "Don't ever @#$%^in' do it again" response. You can't drop the ball in a situation like this one and not absorb some criticism.

*Ryan Cook has been outstanding most of the season as the Athletics' set-up guy, turned closer, turned all-star, turned set up-guy again. But with two outs and a 4-3 lead in the eighth, Cook's wild pitch that allowed Don Kelly to score the tying run was a brutal mistake at the worst time for a time that needed to even the series and couldn't afford to give away so many runs. Granted, the Tigers allowed the A's to tie the game the exact same way in the previous inning when Detroit reliever Joaquin Benoit bounced a pitch to the backstop. But the A's had already been far too generous with the Crisp two-run error.

*Like Cook and Sean Doolittle, who also struggled through their respective innings in relief Sunday, it's a knee-jerk reaction to apply too much blame to Grant Balfour. All three, headlined by Balfour were vital pieces in Oakland's surge to the American League West title. But like many closers who enter non-save situations -tie game starting the bottom of the ninth- and aren't really sharp, Balfour hurt his own cause when he allowed a one-out single to the solid but hardly feared Omar Infante. Not with Cabrera and then Prince Fielder coming up next. Cabrera promptly singled to center and moved Infante to third, forcing the A's to intentionally walk Fielder and allowing Kelly to swing selectively with the bases loaded and in need of just a deep enough fly ball, which Kelly did rather convincingly. It was simply not a good day for the A's bullpen.

What does it all mean? The A's are now facing tall odds as they get out of Comerica Park battered and shaken. They'll be hard-pressed to win one and then two games against a confident, playoff-tested club that has a  significant margin for error knowing it can lose twice in Oakland and still come back with ace Justin Verlander if the series gets to a Game 5. But the A's are far away from even thinking about a fifth game, and they must realize they've done great damage on their own so far.

Good news, bad news

If A's fans would have been told Coco Crisp would lead off the game with a solo home run off Justin Verlander; and Tigers boppers Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder would go a combined 0-for-7; and Oakland starter Jarrod Parker would throw 6 1/3 respectable innings; and reliever Pat Neshek would emotionally record two outs just days after he and his wife suffered the tragic loss of their one-day old infant son days earlier; and the tying run would come to the plate in the eighth inning with Verlander already out of the game; would you take that? Probably. The A's have carved out a reputation as a team that if the game is close in the late innings they have a realistic shot to win or at least tie.

But digging deeper into the 3-1 loss, and it was disappointing for the Athletics despite the positives mentioned above. The A's didn't do a lot wrong without bats in their hands. True, they allowed a run in the first thanks to two diving infielders who got gloves on ground balls but pushed them into the outfield and permitted Tigers' runners to take extra bases. And Parker flipped the ball away from him on a no man's land grounder between first base and the mound that proved to be an error, another extra 90 feet and  a run for the Tigers that proved to be the game-winner in the third. 

But even with Verlander on the mound and the Tigers' best relievers Joaquin Benoit and Jose Valverde needing to throw just an inning each, the A's won't stick around this series very long unless they have better at-bats than they generally lagged through at chilly Comerica Park. It was bad enough that following Crisp's homer they would get just one batter as far as second (Stephen Drew's one-out double in the third). But consider this fact: Oakland hitters had 15 at-bats after a runner had reached base. It's bad enough that those plate appearances resulted in no hits, no walks and 15 outs. But not once in eight tries with less than two outs did the runners as much as advance up one base. 

I'm not advocating that the A's, whose best weapon is the home run ball and aggressive baserunning, resort to bunting over runners and wasting outs for a team hitting .238 in the regular season. And stolen base attempts with Verlander throwing his fastball and Detroit catcher Alex Avila's knack for throwing out base-stealers should be proceeded with caution. But at some point even against an ace like Verlander who got stronger after a somewhat shaky beginning, offenses have to string together something that suggests a rally is possible, and that won't happen if consecutive hitters don't reach, which never happened in Game 1. 

Instead, after Yoenis Cespedes walked in the first, Brandon Moss and Josh Reddick struck out. Following Drew's double in the third, Cespedes couldn't advance him when he bounced out to third, and Moss struck out. In the fourth and fifth, the A's got the leadoff man to first base, but six hitters combined for two strikeouts, two fielder's choice grounders that forced runners at second, and two outfield fly balls. One of the few "good outs" proved to be Moss hitting what at first glance had the makings of a tying two-run home run off Benoit in the eighth that landed in Andy Dirks' glove a couple feet shy of the fence in right. 

OK, enough negative overreaction. Despite the 9:07 a.m. PDT Sunday start that will test the Athletics' West Coast body clocks, the Detroit portion of this series can still provide a major positive and put Oakland in a favorable position to win the series. The A's won't be buried if they go O-for-Motown, but the Tigers' shovels will be within digging distance by the time the visiting buses get to the 880 Hegenberger exit leading to the Coliseum on Tuesday afternoon. So let's just go ahead and call Game 2 a Green and Gold must win to create more suspense and tension, because that's what we're supposed to do in forums like this one. 

Five reasons why......

Five reasons why the A's beat the Tigers in four games:

1. Momentum. Yes, baseball pundits frequently say there is no momentum once you begin a new series. But consider that the last two World Series winners, the 2010 Giants and St. Louis in 2011, both had to clinch their spot in the playoffs with a victory in the final game of the season. They then tore through the National League Division and Championship Series and beat the American League pennant winner. The truth is teams that get hot at the end of the season like the A's can carry on in the postseason. The A's had to play some of their best baseball at the end to reach this spot. That will at least get Oakland past the formidable Tigers.

2. Josh Reddick. He's not the best hitter in the A's lineup as Yoenis Cespedes looks like a star in the making for years to come (but you never know what Billy Beane will do with younger and still reasonably priced stars). However, of the everyday position players, Reddick provides the heartbeat that keeps the club alive over the long haul. Reddick's ability to hit in the clutch -.206 with RISP, compared to Cespedes at .345- has been a question mark. But he had some big moments late in the season such as a two-homer game at Texas on Sept. 27 and a exclamation point two-run shot in the eighth against the Mariners four days later. If Reddick can collect some key hits with runners on base in this series, the A's will have an edge.

3. Brett Anderson. The last "old guy" standing among Oakland starters, 24-year-old Anderson looks like a green light to pitch in Game 3 at the Coliseum on Tuesday. That is sure to be the pivotal game of the series, particularly if the A's and Tigers split the first two games in Detroit. Anderson suffered his strained oblique muscle in his last start ironically against the Tigers on the road. If healthy, the A's should expect Anderson to pitch well. His return could be the wild card that puts his team over the top.

4. Bullpen domination. Let's face it: with rookies Jarrod Parker, Tommy Milone and A.J. Griffin scheduled to start three of the first four games and Anderson coming back from over two weeks of no game action, the A's will probably have to go to the bullpen often in this series figuring none of these starters should be expected to throw complete games or even get into the eighth or ninth. Manager Bob Melvin and pitching coach Curt Young were almost perfect in their decisions in the Texas series, especially in the late innings. Sean Doolittle, Ryan Cook and Grant Balfour were about untouchable throwing the seventh, eighth and ninth innings for all three victories over the Rangers. And less heralded relievers like Jerry Blevins, Evan Scribner and Pat Neshek are capable of getting big outs. But the A's will gladly take six solid innings from the starters and if ahead or tied will feel good about their chances if the bullpen continues to dominate.

5. Fate and destiny. I don't know if the A's are going to win the World Series. But this has been a New York Knights, North Valley League (nee Bad News) Bears and the Willie Mays Hayes/Jake Taylor Pedro Serrano-led Cleveland Indians Hollywood-style run thus far. The A's and the still alive Baltimore Orioles are both having someone nab the movie rights kind of seasons. Anyone else get the hunch these two surprise clubs are going to win their ALDS and play for a World Series berth?


Now, five reasons why the Tigers will win this series in five.

1. Justin Verlander. We talked a lot about Verlander in yesterday's blog. And why shouldn't he top the Tigers' list of reasons to feel good about their hopes? If this series does to go to a fifth game, the A's will have faced Verlander twice. Can they beat him either time, particularly with the series on the line?

2. Miguel Cabrera. He won the Triple Crown for Yaz's sake. And he was productive against the A's this season (.483/.515/.862). With Cabrera hitting in front of Prince Fielder, it's not like the Athletics can pitch around the former and get much relief with the latter. Detroit's Nos. 3 and 4 hitters can arguably win this series on their own offensively if the A's young starters are not stingy with them.

3. Playoff experience. Coco Crisp won a World Series ring in Boston; Seth Smith had a few big hits during the Rockies' run to the National League pennant; Stephen Drew hit two home runs in an Arizona NLDS victory over the Cubs. But the A's can't match the Tigers' postseason-tested pedigree: Cabrera and Fielder have a combined 155 career playoff at-bats; Detroit's Game 2 starter Doug Fister got the win in last year's ALDS Game 5 at Yankee Stadium; despite his overall struggles Verlander has beaten both the A's (2006) and Yankees (2011) in playoff starts. The A's probably don't care about any of this, but many of the Tigers have been through this playoff grind just last season.

4. The 2-3 playoff format. The The A's aren't alone in their home-field advantage disadvantage. Higher seeded teams get three potential home games. But lose the first two on the road and you'll have to win all three of your home games. Facing the daunting Verlander in Game 1, if the A's can't get a split in the first two games, even the anticipated rowdy and rejuvenated Coliseum crowds may not help get Oakland through Detroit down 0-2.

5. Jim Leyland. Bob Melvin deserves every bit the American League Manager of the Year vote as Baltimore's Buck Showalter will command. But the Tigers counter with chain-smoking and grizzled veteran skipper Leyland, whose playoff managerial experience dates back as far 1990, when his Pittsburgh Pirates were led by a still skinny Barry Bonds. Leyland won a 1997 world title in Florida and piloted the Tigers to the 2006 World Series. Melvin has been nothing short of marvelous this season. Leyland has been working his magic for years.

OK, I've analyzed far too much. I'll take the A's in four, but not with a ton of confidence. Either way, this been a fantastic year to be a long-time and sometimes battered A's fan. Let's just hope for a little more fun, and if the A's can win a division series and play on, wonderful. If not.......