What have we actually seen?

- A ton of anonymously sourced “A’s looking at Furcal” stories starting a month ago
- A couple articles this week quoting Furcal’s agent that the A’s are one of several teams kicking Furcal’s figurative tires

That’s it.

So how do we get this from Urban:

All of the above makes it clear that A’s general manager Billy Beane has run out of patience with Bobby Crosby

… leading to this from Nico:

Bobby Crosby has essentially been told that [his career is in jeopardy with his current team]

Precision, please. Mychael, if you have actual inside dope about Beane’s mindset, please share it. And Nico, you should probably know better than to interpolate on Urban’s speculation.

Edgar Renteria and Orlando Cabrera are BIG no-nos. Those are called Brian Sabean moves. I’d rather keep Crosby at 5MM than see either of those guys on a multi-year deal. I know I’ve changed my SS stance way too many times its not even funny.

If the A’s are going to bring in a shortstop, it either has to be Furcal (no 4yr deals plz though), a defense-only guy (IDK?) or a young guy (Hardy? Jumping into a Peavy-Braves trade and snatching up Escobar? A reclamation young guy like Lillibridge?—- The A’s traded for Holliday, so unless the extension is already in the works, a reclamation project might not necessarily be a good idea.).

and 33 in the next 1,596. In some mysterious way, all of his power disappeared.

I would rather have Gregorio Petit be our opening-day shortstop next year than Bobby Crosby.

I personally don’t buy the whole “Beane has totally lost patience with Crosby (hurls chair at Crosby likeness) and that’s why he’s looking into getting Furcal.” To me, the interest in Furcal is purely a matter of circumstance. The A’s happen to have a nice chunk of change available for free agents this winter, and shortstop happens to be the only position on the diamond where there isn’t a proven big-league contributor signed for 2009 or young player in need of big league development at-bats. It’s natural that with that combination of factors (no real impact shortstop prospects in the high minors, money to spend on free agents, need to boost offense) the A’s are looking into Furcal.

I would bet that if the A’s were unable to trade for Holliday, we would be hearing a lot more about Pat Burrell or Adam Dunn right now and how Beane has “lost confidence” in Travis Buck/Carlos Gonzalez and that he’s looking for an immediate upgrade in the outfield. Or, if the team didn’t have any money to spend, we wouldn’t hear anything at all on the free agent front, rather, we’d all just see quotes from Beane/Forst saying “we’re staying the course and have confidence in our roster and are building for the future.”

That being said, there’s no question that Crosby hasn’t lived up to our expectations or the organization’s. But then again, either has Eric Chavez in the years since he signed his 6-year extension. But for right now, with money to spend for once in the free agent market and a premier player available without draft-pick compensation, it just makes sense for the A’s to look into the Furcal possibility, and I think that has more to do with the unique financial position the A’s are in rather than the organization’s complete and utter vexation over Bobby Crosby.

Tell the Blue Jays they can have him and name their price. If they’re not interested, release him. As for a change of scenery helping him, maybe. If there’s a team with a coach/manager who has the nads to tell him, “Move up to the plate or you’ll never get in a game for this team. How do you expect to cover the outside of the plate standing way out there?”

“He was good enough for us before, and he’s good enough for us now”?

In the extremely possible event that the A’s can’t/won’t sign Furcal they still need to replace Bobby Crosby. I believe Crosby has more ability than he’s shown, but that ability will not blossom in Oakland. He needs a change of scenery and a change in perspective to truly develop further.

Plus I loath the guy.

Replacing Crosby can be done one of two ways. Sign a FA or trade for a new SS. Seeing how Beane has traded Gaudin, Harden, Blanton, Haren, Smith, Gonzalez and Street within the last year and hasn’t picked up a single SS prospect in the process, it might make sense to discuss the FA possibilities first. If the A’s can’t land Furcal the next two guys on the SS list are Izturis and Renteria.

I’ll end the suspense for you, I say sign Izturis. (Shocking, I know.)

Let’s say you have the option to sign either player to a 2 year deal plus a team option 3rd year.

You’d be getting Izturis’ 28/29/30 age seasons vs. Renteria’s 33/34/35 seasons.

Izturis will probably cost you half as much annually as Renteria.

PT did some fine work last week but I think he undersold Izturis a bit. Hardballtimes’ RZR ranked Izturis as the 2nd best defensive SS in 2008 and Bill James had him tied for 3rd best in saving runs during the season. (Sorry, no links to James, it’s a pay site & I’m not giving up my password to the masses.) Based on that, I think you could argue that Izturis’ 2009 projection should be a +15 on defense, making him equal in effectiveness to the projection made for Renteria.

Cesar Izturis is a younger player offering equivalent overall production at half the price. I understand wanting to have a 3rd or even 4th option before signing Izturis but signing Renteria would be a mistake.

It just doesn’t seem like something Beane would bring out in public – although it could be assumed by everyone on the planet.

In my opinion he is done…Look when there are stories on the A’s website about the A’s possible interest in Furcal or other shortstops that is when, I would like to think anyways, you know someone is done. I just cant see Crosby coming back after all of these things floating around out there about Crosby/New A’s SS. Crosby has to know that the A’s are actively trying to replace him. If your boss let it leak to multiple people that they were interested in multiple options to replace you and basically have made it clear who they really want, and that person is not you, dont you think that you would either A quit B ask them to get rid of you so you can get your pay for a couple weeks and unemployment, C) at the very least fear for your job. Okay scratch the first two because in todays economy I doubt any of us are to eager to go looking for new work. Regardless this cant sit well with Bobby.

and Bobby Christine?

At least with Crosby there is upside. Rentaria, I suppose, if he is cheap, but BLEGH! Crosby could still pan out, its not bloody likely, but I’d be pissed to the the A’s commit to mediocrity at a high price when Crosby at least offers a glimmer of hope that he has been quite good before and that his defense is, at worst, average.

If anyone but Furcal is going to replace him it better be via trade or the farm. O-Cab and E-Rent suck…

Izturis is going to put up an offensive line that’s very similar to what the Petit/Pennington two-headed monster will do, if not worse. His defense won’t be so much better than that duo so as to justify giving him $5M to their paltry $400K. Not a great use of resources, IMO.

The pursuit of Furcal, even if it doesn’t bear fruit, is helping to already lay the groundwork for discussions about trading Crosby to other teams who need shortstops.

It sounds much better in a trade discussion to say, “We need to unload him because we’re trying very hard to sign Furcal,” than it does to say, “We need to unload him because he’s very sh-tty.”