... is that the A's injury/debilitation/DTD problems the last several years may be an "artificial" artifact of Beane maintaining (as best he can) a 'roid/HGH(/greenie?)-free clubhouse.

Yes, the A's have acquired some players on the cheap because of their medical histories -- but they've also paid dearly for some players with bad medical histories (Kendall, Kotsay, Chavez [recall that Chavvy's shoulder has been an acknowledged problem since high school]). They've also run into a remarkable streak of bad-luck injuries/debilitations with otherwise-healthy players.

It may be that Beane's recent emphasis on unquantifiable "character" assets in players is code for "reputation for not using PEDs." (Which could possibly be reinforced by the emphasis on second-gen MLBers, whose pappies schooled 'em in "right way to do things" -- i.e., 'roidin' = cheatin'.)

Now, to me, this still wouldn't excuse Beane and the FO/training/medical staff for not having a world-class training/conditioning program. (The lack thereof could certainly be evidence contradicting my pet theory -- you'd think if Beane had embarked on such a mission, he'd have had his bases covered, so to speak, by implementing a training/conditioning program to make up for the absence of recuperative PEDs.) And it could also explain some of our lack of power.

Health is just the most obvious component of it.

You grab guys who have the potential to be much better than their salaries:
Frank Thomas or Mike Piazza do to age and health
Esteban Loaiza due to inconsitency
Milton Bradley due to health and 'character' issues [isn't it a good thing that he had a problem with Jeff Kent?]
Shannon Stewart due to health
Jay Marshall due to inexperience/oddity

we need to field players who will be more productive than their salaries, since our payroll is so much lower than the big spenders.

The best way to do that is by amassing young talent. As of last winter, though, when considering 2007, we were pretty much playing the hand we were dealt in that regard and when we asked other teams for help, they were pretty much saying, 'go fish'. It's also difficult to sustain success in this realm, since there's only so much a team can do with a low draft pick.

Mark Mulder, Barry Zito and Eric Chavez were all top-10 picks. Thanks to such stellar draft picks, we haven't had a top-10 pick since then. We've only had one in the top-20 (as compensation for Johnny Damon) and it turned out pretty darn well for us, in the person of Nick Swisher.

Since BB hasn't had the opportunity to draft top young players, thanks to the on field success of his teams and other teams have mostly caught up in terms of player evaluation -- he needed a new edge.

That edge is combining high risk/reward guys with a ton of depth.

Last year, it worked perfectly as designed. This year ... it's been a little rough so far -- but despite tying the team record for the most players on the DL at one time, we're still a .500 team and only 4.5 back.

We'll need to have more of these risks work out (health specifically) if we're going to match last year's success -- but at this point, we've gotta be pretty happy with where we are.

aka, the Lost Toy Ratio

for the past decade, every player personel decision for the a's has boiled down to two things 1) will this player help us win, and 2) can we "hire" this player for the least amount of money possible. recently the a's are finding players with high levels of past performance but who are rehabbing off injury and/or players who were expected to perform at high levels but haven't due to injury (i.e. snelling) fit into the above criteria.

listen, most GMs would have been fired for what beane has done over the past 24 months. but the player personel decisions by beane have been well thought out by the whole a's organization- from the player personel-side, to the accountants and finally the ownership group. if you look at the big picture this approach is rather smart-both baseball and business wise.

first, baseball; you sign a bunch of players who are attempting to resurrect their careers. in my mind this is the best type of player to sign. they're cheap and they usually only want 1 yr contracts. plus they are usually highly motivated. they're excellent pickups. give me a full roster of stewarts', thomas' and pizzamans'and i'ii kick your ass in any fantsay league. finally, you CAN'T fall in love with these guys! expect them to leave in one yr.  

second, business; let's say some of these players are DLed for 30-45 maybe 60 days during a 6 month season. well, if i'm not mistaken, all MLB teams take out insurance on players so when they are DLed the team pays a fraction of the salary while the insurance company pays the rest. so actually, the a's save money when a player is injuried but continue to collect ticket monies at the wicket and the season ticket holders have already paid up. so while the a's budget is reported to be around 80 million the team may save 3-4-5 million on unpaid salaries due to injuries.

but, as i see it, there are two problems to this strategy. the first  being what is currently happening with the a's roster. the a's are experiencing the "perfect storm" of injuries. for this strategy to work the team can't sustain winning with 10-11 starters on the DL. no team, including the a's, can stock their AAA team for such emergencies. soon, losing will happen...and i mean long periods of losing. the other problem is it forces the GM to be absolutely sure of the players he signs or trades for who possess long term contracts. players like kendell, chavey, harden, street, kotsay. this is the one area beane has probably overplayed his hand and thus gotten burned at the river. and really, it's not kendell's fault or chavey's or harden's or kotsay's fault that the a's offered them long term contracts or traded for them with preexsisting contracts. it's beane's fault. so, i suppose, part of beane's "moneyball 3" philosophy (if there is such a thing) has been proven effective but one can easily question some of the decisions beane has made.      

http://www.lookoutlanding.com/story/...

"Is it still bad karma
if we root for injuries to one of our own?"

And the training staff makes sure that if the players don't come injury prone, they become injury prone in a hurry.

Does anyone else see the paradox in going after injury prone players as the new market inefficiency?  Billy exploits undervalued players because he has a low budget and can't afford the big time free agents (or doesn't want to blow a huge portion of the payroll on just one player).  But currently we are PAYING a whole slew of players for not playing!  I know our budget is not as low as other teams, but how can we afford to pay players to not play?!!  I don't get it.

Maybe Billy's doing this to throw everyone off and follow his lead like every other time?  I don't know, I don't see Billy as diabolical like that.

I particularly enjoyed the stuff from devo and bigE but several posters deserve kudos.

To the bigger question, can this strategy continue long term... my thought is "No". The key to making this kind of plan work is to have a solid core to build around. Guys like Thomas and Stewart and even Bradley were all meant to suppliment what was already existing. The reason why the A's have struggled the last two years was/is not because these peripheral players have struggled, but because core players like Kotsay, Crosby and Chavez have been hurt and have not performed up to expectations. Kendall is another key component, but his struggles this season are not (to my knowledge) attributed to injury.

And sticking with the 2007 season for a moment, having Duke and Street on the DL has cost the A's games they should have won. The bullpen was supposed to be THE strength of the roster and that hasn't happened. The financial investment in the bullpen isn't that great but that's largely because of the lack of accrued experience, not of importance.

Back to the bigger question.

Beane's strategy wasn't to mix cheap, beat-up vets with an injury prone core, the intent was to find low risk/high rewards types to fill in the margins around his set roster. Almost 1/3 of the A's financial resources in 2007 are tied to Chavez, Kotsay and Kendall and that leaves Beane with little room to manuever. Simply put, he chose his core players poorly and has made a bad investment. As the A's shed these inefficient contracts (or increase their salary expenditures) Beane will have the ability to focus on building a new core of players with Nick Swisher looking like the 1st of that group.

Beane can continue to look for cheap vets looking for an opportunity to prove themselves if he can get consistent and efficient production from his core group. If his foundation is weak than the inherent volatility of his one year wonders will lead to a lot of inconsistent play by the Oakland A's.

As for drafting players with injury histories, what matters most is the type of injury the player sustained. In this day and age a pitcher who undergoes TJ surgery isn't that great of a risk. It's very rare for a pitcher to need TJ surgery twice in his career, and while its certainly possible that a team drafting such a player will never see the stuff they saw before the surgery I doubt that the chances of said player failing to develope are significantly lower than those of someone who's never had cadaver parts introduced into their arm. Besides, the initial investment in a surgically rebuilt arm will likely be lower than the cost of investing in a similiar player who has managed to avoid the knife. So you've reduced your risk while maintaining a large degree of the upside.

Now, if we're talking shoulder surgery for a pitcher than I'd prefer the A's stay away.

Meanwhile, Harden, Crosby, Chavez, Buck, and Street, along with Hudson and Mulder before them, were homegrown and had no particular injury history that would make them "known injury risks" going in.

I'd say lately, there's a bigger issue with players the A's develop getting hurt than there is with high-risk investments backfiring.

...Mark Prior and Kerry Wood, we haven't plumbed the depths of this sector!

Whaddaya think we could give the Cubbies for 'em?

you're all wrong.

Needs to answer the question posted earlier:

What are the financial ramifications of a player on the DL for the A's pocketbook? Do they get a refund on the percentage of the contract for each DL stay, or for season-ending injuries, etc.?

We need to know that answer.

Are their contracts insured, and what does the language in the contract provide the team?

Disagree with this if you like:

Bad athletes get injured more often than good athletes.

*The A's don't tend to ever field a team of great athletes - 5-tool players are expensive. The skills that the A's value the most have NOTHING to do with athleticism whatsoever:
a.) Offense: Plate discipline/mastery of the strike zone
b.) Pitching: The ability to throw strikes and avoid walks.
c.) Defense: Prioritizing the skill of consistently fielding the ball - think Ellis - over raw athleticism and range.

If you believe, like I do, that less athletic people are more likely to get hurt - and if you watched Piazza slide, you know what I'm talking about - then it makes sense that the A's, as they are currently constructed (see a, b, and c), will always be more injury-prone than the typical team. It's not "bug" that will go away in a future year; that's why it keeps coming back. And it probably isn't Larry Davis' or the player's fault, either.

None of that is an explanation for the current maladies, which are a "perfect storm" of occurences. It's just an explanation for why it annually happens to the A's.

But the majority of the roster doesn't have those types of skills.

You're both right, it's a crappy argument.

You win this round, bastards.