Uh, well, besides John Fisher's Gap stores, there aren't any jeans for sale in Oakland.
Three prominent figures from Moneyball are now with the Oakland Athletics. Nick Swisher, Joe Blanton and Jeremy Brown. Yes, you all know about Jeremy Brown already thanks to the DLD.
Brown might not get into any games this weekend given that Adam Melhuse is a very capable catcher and could possibly even inject some life into the offense. Although if Brown does make his debut, it could be on Thursday for the day game after a night game.
It's been a long, strange trip in the career of Brown. But many scouts doubted that he would ever wind up in the show. He's often pointed to as the example about how the A's approach is overrated and overhyped (completely neglecting the fact that the A's needed to take someone who was going to take less money to sign because of their numerous early picks that year).
Now the only reason Brown is with the A's is because of Kendall's suspension, so don't expect people to praise the A's yet. But Brown has performed well in his Triple-A debut this season. Most think Brown's upside is that of a big league back-up catcher. The A's will take that for now.
And what is it about Toronto that seems to call out to Michael Lewis? Didn't Nick Swisher wind up making his debut there as well a few years ago and Lewis had to make his way north of the border?
As for the Moneyball mention, it just so happens to be the topic of my most recent Straight A's column for FSN Bay Area. Do I really think the A's could ever move towards a speed team? Probably not, but then again many people didn't think the A's could have a draft dominated by high school pitchers and they did that. Many people didn't think the A's would ever value defense as a major component to the make up of a team. And look at this team now...no more T-Long in center and Jeremy Giambi in left field.
The point is that the A's often move in directions they think they can exploit. I just have a hard time believing that the A's would ever move towards stolen bases because they have all the research about giving away outs.
