OPEN SEASON

Eric Byrnes traded to Colorado. Also, those Jay Payton for Chad Bradford rumors have become fact. Ladies and gentlemen, the Billy Beane trading season has begun. But first, a haiku in honor of our departing players.

Eric Byrnes, Rockie
Bay Area native son
have fun in Denver

Chadwick Lee Bradford
was featured in Moneyball
now in the limelight

To OAK: Joe Kennedy, Jay Witasick (from COL); Jay Payton (from BOS)
To COL: Eric Byrnes, Omar Quintanilla
To BOS: Chad Bradford

This trade wasn't really unexpected, I called the Byrnes/Kennedy deal about a month ago. The euphoria of a winning June made me forget about the trade till today, when it actually happened. This was going to happen this season. Why else would a fan favorite be excluded from all of the A's TV ads and not get his own bobblehead this year?

I will miss Byrnes. His energy and "hustle" was always a joy to see...until he screws up badly in a key defensive situation. I sure hope he finds success at Coors Field, may his numerous Coliseum popups turn into Coors Field home runs. The A's have truly lost some RH pop against lefties, but the A's don't match up against that many lefties.

Bradford is another player I will miss. I hope the additional exposure from the East Coast media outlets (a la Tejada) will help him get a nice contract in the offseason. It has been observed that the A's bullpen has been transformed into a more conventional unit with pitchers with hard breaking stuff have replaced "funky" pitchers like Bradford and Mecir.

The trading of Quintanilla may mean that Beane is pleased with the current 2B platoon (Scutaro and Ellis, in my eyes), at least for now. I think Scutaro got on Beane's good side by learning how to draw walks during the offseason in the Winter Leagues. Quintanilla's average has dropped since previous years and on top of that, he isn't a prototypical "Billy Beane" player. I think Ginter's being shopped and will probably be dealt by the deadline.

So, is Beane a buyer or a seller this year? Is he tooling for the playoffs in '05 or '06? Will Beane get that power bat he's been searching for in vain?

I'm starting to believe that '05 is not a lost season after all.

To all the players who are leaving, I sure hope you succeed in your new enviroments. To all of the players coming in, welcome.