What the A's are doing...
I got a few e-mails asking me what the A's are doing. I'm guessing that Beane figured the A's won't be competitive enough to go all the way in 2005 without Hudson so, since he already had gotten an idea of what the Cards were willing to give up for Hudson, he just went back to them and proposed something for Mulder that made him happy too.
I like the Hudson trade, the Mulder one not as much unless there is something physically wrong with him that caused him to fade so badly in the second half. With the new guys together as a team in 2005, they can then go into 2006 with a year's experience under their belt but still hopefully be competitive in 2005. Though probably not competitive enough to go all the way without another Beane special trade during the season (like when he picked up Jose Guillen for nothing).
So nothing immediate helpwise, though their bullpen is now pretty formidable with Cruz, Calero, Street and Dotel, and that's just the ones I know. Plus they have a nice bunch of young starters with potential but still learning so the great bullpen will be very necessary.
I think he looked at it this way: while he could adjust offensively pretty easily the past few years for the losses of Giambi and Tejada, there's no way you replace a Hudson or Mulder easily and thus it would have been another two years of adjusting downward the pitching rotation to account for the loss of Hudson and then Mulder. Plus perhaps he sees no starter coming up fast to replace them and so he needed to trade them to get their replacements.
Consequently, he decided to bite the bullet, really made the bullpen rock solid in the process - a neccessity with all the young starters, as noted above - got some nice offensive pieces too in Johnson and Barton, the former contributing now, the latter contributing maybe later.
Pretty good all the way around. I just thought that he could have gotten more for Mulder, it seemed like he got less from the Cards than he did for Hudson. Now if only he gives away Brynes to us for spare parts...
I like the Hudson trade, the Mulder one not as much unless there is something physically wrong with him that caused him to fade so badly in the second half. With the new guys together as a team in 2005, they can then go into 2006 with a year's experience under their belt but still hopefully be competitive in 2005. Though probably not competitive enough to go all the way without another Beane special trade during the season (like when he picked up Jose Guillen for nothing).
So nothing immediate helpwise, though their bullpen is now pretty formidable with Cruz, Calero, Street and Dotel, and that's just the ones I know. Plus they have a nice bunch of young starters with potential but still learning so the great bullpen will be very necessary.
I think he looked at it this way: while he could adjust offensively pretty easily the past few years for the losses of Giambi and Tejada, there's no way you replace a Hudson or Mulder easily and thus it would have been another two years of adjusting downward the pitching rotation to account for the loss of Hudson and then Mulder. Plus perhaps he sees no starter coming up fast to replace them and so he needed to trade them to get their replacements.
Consequently, he decided to bite the bullet, really made the bullpen rock solid in the process - a neccessity with all the young starters, as noted above - got some nice offensive pieces too in Johnson and Barton, the former contributing now, the latter contributing maybe later.
Pretty good all the way around. I just thought that he could have gotten more for Mulder, it seemed like he got less from the Cards than he did for Hudson. Now if only he gives away Brynes to us for spare parts...
posted by obsessivegiantscompulsive at 12/20/2004 03:03:00 PM
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