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Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Ummm...The San Jos-A's

Ummm...The San Jos-A's?


                Connie Mack, when are you coming back?If the former manager/owner of the Philadelphia A's were alive today, I don't know what he would make of this.His Athletics moving to their FOURTH city...supposedly ,anyway...rumor has it that San Jose is the front runner to land the team, although other bids have come from Sacramento and Freemont(Freemont?Really?),leaving their fans in Oakland in a sort of New Jersey Nets kind of limbo.Too bad, they have kind of an interesting(if very young)team.The Cuban defector alone is worth the price of admission.As of right now, the A's are ,I believe, the only team left still playing their home games in what is unofficially a football stadium(Oakland Coliseum),so maybe a baseball-only park would help, but I'm not sure that's happening.The only ones who are happy with the pending move are the owners of the San Fransisco Giants, who would have the area's fan base all to themselves(Oh, and San Jose).Question is:How did it get to this point...



                     Well, starting in 1901, the Philadelphia A's were one of the original 16 teams in the newly formed AL/NL format.About a decade in, Connie Mack's team had the first of it's 2 mini dynasties, with players like Rube Wadell,"Home Run" Baker,Eddie Collins and so on.(Their infield was called the "Million Dollar infield", a price that today wouldn't even land you a back-up shortstop)After that team won a few pennants and titles, he sold his players off and spent the next bunch of years in the second division(A tactic future A's owners would follow,unfortunately), only to re-emerge in the late 20's with an even scarier team ,consisting of more hall of famers like Jimmie Foxx,Micky Cochrane,Al Simmons and Lefty Grove, who again would win a few more pennants and titles.After this team was dismantled however, they wouldn't see a pennant for a long, long time.


       
After years of little success, the team moved to Kansas city in 1955.These teams were fairly unsuccessful and mainly nondescript.In fact, the only thing that comes to mind about The KC A's is that the Yankees got Roger Maris from them(and had sent Billy Martin to them earlier).In 1960,Charles O.Finley bought the team, and would eventually move them to Oakland, but not before he convinced Brian Epstein, manager of the Beatles, to have the fab four play in his park in KC.(In the book,"Beatles, a Hard days night",there's a part where Finley is discussing money with the Beatles manager, while in the back round John Lennon is saying "You paid too much for us, Chuck"....would have loved to be a fly on the wall there)...


                 Finally, in 1968, the team moved to it's current location(for now) in Oakland.The seeds of the franchise's third dynasty were already there:Catfish Hunter,Reggie Jackson,Rollie Fingers,Vida Blue etc.,a team who would win 3 straight Championships from 72-74(and would have won more, if not for free agency), then spent the late 70's as maybe the worst team in baseball, no offense to Dave Chalk and Mitchell Paige... Local boy Ricky Henderson came up in 1979, and along with crazy ass Billy Martin ,would make the team exciting for a bit(especially if you like stolen bases).But "Billy ball"(a fancy way of saying "Burn your pitchers out")wouldn't last long, and they would again sink to the bottom, only to emerge when the steroid twins showed up, along with recovering alcoholic and future hall of famer Dennis Eckersly(Not making fun, I love Eck, and he showed a lot of bravery to recover),Dave Stewart,Carney Lansford and such...again,3 straight pennants from 1988-1990...although ,it must be said that the 2 teams that beat them,the Dodgers and the Reds, were 2 of the WORST teams ever to win a World Series...only one Hall of famer on either team(Barry Larkin)...that team faded as well...fast forward to a decade later...


 1974 World Series,Game Two
                    The early 2000's brought on Billy Beane and his Moneyball(haven't read the book or seen the movie, but I get the gist),and while it's a great story, it did kind of lead to what is happening now, as in, the impending move.Number crunching may be a great way to deal with a limited payroll, but I'm not sure it gets the asses in the seats.As it is,the A's are still,Championship-wise, the third most successful team in baseball. with 9, trailing only the Yankees and Cardinals, so the franchise will continue,and if it's in San Jose, so be it...hey, the city has supported a hockey team, after all(I could go a rant about warm weather cities with hockey teams, but I'll spare you ...), so it may not be as bad as I'm making it...it's just,I like tradition...in baseball,at least, so all this moving around gets a little unsettling.I've been to both Oakland and San Jose, and liked them both, so in conclusion I'd just like to say...Freemont?Really?...

1 comment:

  1. I have a hard time sympathizing with teams like the Athletics, because somehow teams like the Twins and the Rays have been getting it done on limited payrolls. And no one believes that the poormouthing clubs are as poor as they claim. The White Elephants need to draft better and spend some more money. Also, the taxpayers of the Bay Area have been resistant to building stadiums for twenty years. The Giants had to finance theirs themselves. So I don't know what Oakland is going to do ultimately.

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