First, we don't know if the A's are buyers are sellers. In fact I'm not even sure the A's know if they're buyers or sellers.

They have one legitimate sell chip in Zito and another reasonable one in Payton, but that's it. NOBODY wants Kendall. NOBODY wants DJ. NOBODY wants Kotsay. There are a lot of guys on this team who probably actually have negative trade value, so assuming we can not only get rid of them, but get rid of them for something of meaning is a pipe dream. That being said, if they choose to sell, Zito would figure to bring in a sweet haul (the Milledge/McCarthy/etc. names abound) and Payton could find himself on a team like the Yankees in return for some decent, cheap, controllable youngsters like perhaps Darrell Rasner, Colter Bean, TJ Beam, or Bronson Sardinha. Not top flight prospects, mind you, but guys definitely worth having.

Buying would be a bit difficult. The A's real prospectish chips would probably include Windsor, Casilla, Komine, Melillo, and some of the lower minor league guys. The problem ultimately with this is that the market offers little in the way of B level talent. There are the superstars out there, DTrain, Abreu, Soriano, Carlos Lee, etc. but not many guys, hitters especially, that the A's could probably get to help them. I think Julio Lugo would be attainable, but that would effectively mean giving up on Crosby, and I highly doubt Beane and co. are ready to do that, nor am I especially positive they'd be wrong in not wanting to do that anyway. Getting a guy like Wilson Betemit would perhaps help, and I think we have what it takes to get him. I think we have what it takes to get Ryan Shealy, with the Rockies considering Rodrigo Lopez and Jeremy Affeldt deals according to MLB.com (and while in a previous post I stated I wasn't a big Shealy fan, if Rodrigo Lopez is the price to pay I'd  be heartily dissapointed if we didn't bother to top it.) Sean Casey or Craig Wilson would offer some help, though not necessarily a ton, and Pittsburgh has had some weird asking prices in the past. There's also Eric Hinske, whom someone made a diary about a few days back. I personally think he'd be the best option, filling in at third (though sloppily) to give Chavez a spell and being able to shift around at 1B/DH. I think it'd perhaps be even possible to get him without having to dangle Windsor either. Anyway my point is that none of these options would be likely to have a huge impact unless we managed to acquire 2 or 3 of them, and I wouldn't think twice about that kind of activity playing out in Oakland on this deadline.

So, ultimately, my point is that a lot of the trade ideas, while certainly fun, don't seem to take into account the actual trade deadline market. I'd love to see some creative ideas floated out there, and to be honest I'd be lying if I said I didn't see a number of them I did in fact like, but the majority seem to be, for lack of a better word, a little clueless, and admittedly there's really nothing I could come up with myself that'd be any better. And really that's ultimately the problem. It's going to be a dull deadline this year, there just isn't the market fluidity we're used to out there. Too many teams that think they're in it and too many teams shopping big names with huge price tags that few teams can meet.