Nice that the A's did not go gently into that good night. Perhaps the Rangers' late rally yesterday carried over into today's game; perhaps the A's late rally today will carry over into tomorrow's game.
Even with a loss, the A's have won 5 of 6 and 18 of 23. I've been thinking about the back-and-forth debate: Are the A's playing way over their head, are they this good--or if they are somewhere in between, then where? I just want to throw a theory out there (it's in the more optimistic vein) because I haven't heard it expressed.
There's an expression that goes, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." We all knew that 2005 was a year for the young players to experience some growing pains, struggle at times, mature, and eventually emerge the better for it. Is it possible that the extreme adversity of May enabled this maturing process to accelerate, so that the A's are now ahead of where they would have been had May been less painful? It's a nice thought, because we all (myself included) tend to bemoan the hole dug early and utter sentences that begin "If only..." Yet this theory, if correct, would mean that the A's could not be playing as well as they are now if they hadn't suffered through that excruciating three weeks in May. Hey, right or wrong it's my new story and I'm sticking with it.
