to re-tool his swing, and have Cunningham take his place.

I’m still not sold on Hairston/Rajai as long term options, who are having career yrs in their late 20’s. But they are the best options for now, plus they are needed right handed bats. Both are signed for a couple more years. Sweeney is in his 2nd full season at age 24. His offense would be terrible if he remained in an OF corner spot, but would be passable if he remained in CF. Actually, all 3 Sweeney/Rajai/Hairston would be better off in CF.The other issues is when Cunningham or Buck are called up at some point, they need to play every day.

the A’s (and a lot of other teams) probably feel its worth keeping certain corner outfielders in the minors a little longer while they really figure out their offense. Indeed, a list of current corner OFs who never received regular MLB playing time until they were 26 or older would include the following:

Brad Hawpe, Ben Zobrist, Jason Werth, Cody Ross, Michael Cuddyer, Ryan Ludwick, Jack Cust, Raul Ibanez, Randy Winn, Eric Byrnes, Scott Hairston and Nelson Cruz.

I’d imagine a lot of players on that list were encouraged to focus on honing their old-player skills during their development. For a corner outfielder, power is generally considered more important than contact skills, defense, or speed, so its not like these guys are automatically going to go into decline if they’re still under club control at age 30 (although its pretty unlikely such players will continue to be productive well into their FA years – if their bat speed or vision deteriorate they have little left to offer).

Its also worth noting a lot of these guys had Buck-like campaigns of 300 PAs or less prior to their age 26 years. And that’s part of my point too. If Cunningham comes up and rides the pine for a couple weeks this isn’t necessarily cause for alarm, nor does it mean the A’s don’t have high hopes for him, or don’t believe he can be a starter. He’s only 23, has a sub-.900 OPS at AAA, and he definitely looks like he could add some muscle to that rakish frame of his. For that matter, Buck, at 25, may not be as much of a lost cause as his recent numbers would indicate.

Also, fwiw, I don’t think Cunningham would be eligible to return to Oakland until the beginning of September since he was sent down less than two weeks ago (personally I would have DL’d Hairston and kept Cunningham around – making a guy with sore hammies play everyday is tempting fait, IMO, and there’s no reason to do that at this point in the season).