Off day conversation: Who is your favorite Oakland Athletic who wasn’t that good?

The best baseball players aren’t always our favorite players. Mike Trout is a nice guy but also rather boring, most interested in the Bay Area micrco-climates and less so in being the face of baseball. Bryce Harper has nice hair but limited appeal otherwise.

Among our A’s, this rings even more true. Josh Donaldson was always the best player on the teams of the 2012-2014, but for few was he the ultimate favorite. That’s not knock on Donaldson, who was beloved by the fanbase and a generally awesome Athletic. He just didn’t charm quite like other worse players did. Brandon Moss, Yoenis Cespedes, Coco Crisp and more were always the top fan favorites, productive but non-star players who were also faces of the franchise.

And below them were the guys who just weren’t that good, but still found their way into our hearts. Brad Mills, Jerry Blevins, Tommy Milone and more will always be etched in our memories. So let’s talk about awesome but not really that awesome players!

Criteria

None, really. Just anyone who strikes you as someone who makes sense here! Mehren, yes, Sogard counts. Tutu, you know the answer: KOUUUZZZ was bad.

Some random players that come to mind

Travis Blackley

Easy choice here, though a bit of a cop out as Blackley was actually a good player with the A’s. He did have his share of good fortune, and his career year was a big part of the A’s overcoming expectations to pull off one of the greatest regular season stories of all time. There were better pitchers on that roster, there were other fun pitchers who made an impact, but Blackley will always be my favorite.

Tommy Everidge

In the doldrums of the Geren era, we had to grab on to any glimmer of hope we could. It was probably foolish to get so excited about Tommy Everidge, who at the time was dominating AAA in his age 26 season. But he was a local product, a fun story, and the A’s had nothing to lose by giving him a shot.

AN was abuzz at his promotion, but ultimately he just couldn’t hack it at the big league level. There’s a happy ending here. Everidge is now the hitting coach for the Stockton Ports! You go Tommy.

Please enjoy this amazing picture of Everidge, in which he looks like the first civilian placed in the witness protection/Minor League Baseball partnership program.

Josh Outman

The name Outman is just too darn perfect. Combine that with Outman’s interesting and extremely dumb looking desired mechanics and you’ve got an interesting story that I will root for for the rest of time.

Antonio Perez

Honestly, no clue why I was drawn to Antonion Perez. He was one strikeout away from batting below .100, and it was an act of the baseball gods the kept him from getting there. Lord knows had he gone up to bat, he would have gotten out. His OPS with the A’s was lower than Ted Williams batting average at his peak, and he just kinda looked sa all the time.

Matt Murton and Bobby Kielty

For the hair. Always about the hair.

Who is your favorite not-so-great Athletic of all time?