The Oakland Athletics are in familiar territory. Territory that their fans know is coming after every 3-5 year stretch of postseason qualification. That territory looks a lot like the absence of the stars they’ve grown accustomed to cheering on 81 times at home every baseball season.
Oakland has been painted as the team that every contender will pick from, by the baseball community at large. Matt Olson is front & center of that movement, and rightfully so. The 27-year old first baseman is a General Manager’s dream. He’s eclipsed the 20-HR threshold four of his six MLB seasons, with a 36 & 39 homerun season sprinkled in. He’s as offense as it gets this offseason. Most importantly, he has cheap team control remaining. He won’t be a free agent until 2024. He’s certainly an Anthopoulos target should Freddie take his talents elsewhere.
But we’re not going to dive deep into him unless Freddie puts us in that position.
We’re here to talk about three of his teammates that Atlanta should compete for. And we know Oakland will listen. They showed last season that they’ll move young guys to other ball clubs that have stud potential, when they dealt Jesus Luzardo (2027 UFA) to Miami.
Oakland Arms
The A’s have three starting pitchers that would take Atlanta’s rotation to the next level. A level that hasn’t been reached in the NL East in quite some time. And in prime Oakland fashion, they’re all cheap…