Kevin Vranes has a phud in Physical Ocean- ography and Cli- matology. He now studies sci- ence policy and politics at the The first post in this series (it wasn't a series then but it is now) was a flashback on Chapter 5 of the fabulous Moneyball by Michael Lewis.
In this post I'm mopping up the rest of the book, tracking down the worth-tracking-down players mentioned elsewhere throughout the book for various reasons. Note that I'm leaving out a bunch of bit-player minor ballers for the sake of time. In the next post I'll give the stats for every player the A's selected in the 2002 draft and maybe sometime in the future, if I get really bored and the weather isn't really nice out, I'll come up with a sabermetric way to compare the 2002 drafts of each team in 2006 currency.
[By the way, I mentioned Matt Cain in the first post, he being the unnamed #25 pick going to the Giants. I'm listening to the Giants play the Angels right now (interleague) on XM and Cain just lost a no-hit bid in the middle of the 8th.]
Pitchers:
Chad Bradford: This is the submariner who belonged to the ChiSox, who had him languishing in AAA even though he had been lights out in the bigs, until Beane/DePodesta saved him by shipping "some minor league catcher" over for Bradford. He was solid for the A's with about a 3 ERA and amazing K/BB ratio until his 2004 season when it was just a mediocre 2:1. Now he's with the Mets (oh, and by the way, I looked at the NL East standings for the first time in a long time today and spit my coffee all over the paper when I saw the Mets' record) and is at 3.0 ERA with a sizzling 19:4 K/BB ratio.
Ricardo Rincon: The player Beane took from the Indians in the middle of a series. About the same solid stats as Bradford while with Oakland, now with STL but hasn't pitched much this year, carrying an 11 ERA in 3 IPs.
Ted Lilly: Every Yankee fan knows exactly who this is. Beane wanted him because he figured he was way undervalued, especially compared to Jeff Weaver. Beane figured he could get the Yankees to go after Weaver and Weaver's big salary and thus give up Lilly. Lilly was decent for Oakland with an ERA a bit over 4 and a pretty good K/BB. He's been with the Bleu Jays for the past 3 seasons with a record at about .500, an ERA that went 4 to 5.5 and back to 4 and a K/BB ratio of about 2:1.
Jon Adkins: See note on Ray Durham below. Only year he's had decent innings as a reliever was 2004 with the ChiSox, 4.65 ERA in 62 IPs with a 2:1 K/BB ratio. 18 IPs this year for the Padres with an ERA near 4.
Hitters:
Jeremy Giambi:: Remember him? The big lardo who hit lead-off for the A's because of his amazing OBP. Then Beane sent him off in a pique in the middle of the 2002 season because Giambi was partying too much in Boston during a road trip. Giambi's OBP rose 40 points after being traded to the Phils, then dropped almost 100 points the following season (to a still respectable .342) with the BoSox, but with a .197 average and he hasn't played since.
John Mabry: The player the A's got in exchange for Giambi. Hit .275 with a .322 OBP and a very nice .523 slugging percentage (110 points better than his career) for the A's in the 2002 season. He's been bouncing around in the mid 200's for the Cards, M's and Cubs since then. Slugged .504 for the Cards in 2004.
Marshall McDougall: The third baseman the A's gave up for Rincon. One season in the majors (2005), hit .167 in 18 games for the Rangers.
Kevin Youkilis: The stud first baseman Beane tried to get out from under the BoSox. Unluckily for Beane, Mr. Theo had just recently gotten the ear of John Henry and Theo knew the value of Youkilis so there was no way the BoSox were letting him go. This year he's at .317/.431/.514 with 9 HRs.
Scott Hatteberg: The pickin' machine, catcher-turned-1B by Beane who just wanted the bat. Had an average in the mid/high 200's with an OBP in the mid 300's in his four years with Oakland and is currently at .290/.401(!!)/.426 with the Reds.
Ray Durham: All star second baseman the A's got from the ChiSox for a AAA pitcher named Jon Adkins. Played in 54 games for the A's in '02 (.274/.350/.457) and has been with Los Gigantes ever since, batting in the .280/.290 area with OBP in the .350/.360 region and slugging in the mid 400's. This year he's down, hitting only .244 but staying near his career numbers in OBP and slugging.
Carlos Pena: The player Beane was willing to ship off in mid 2002 because Beane figured him overvalued. Been with the Tigers ever since, batting around his career averages of .243/.330/.459.
If I missed interesting players please note them below in the comments or email me and I'll update this post.
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