Newsday (N.Y.): Despite low budget, A's battling for wild card

September 21, 2012 by Art Spander in articles, baseball

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

OAKLAND, Calif. -- The Athletics' tough and important 10-game trip took a positive turn Thursday after a much-needed 12-4 win over the Tigers in Detroit that averted a three-game sweep.

The next stop for the surprising A's is the Bronx Friday night for the start of a three-game series against the Yankees. Then it's on  to Texas to play the American League West-leading Rangers.

Seth Smith homered, doubled and drove in four runs yesterday. The trip did not get off to a good start for Oakland. Lefthander Brett Anderson went down Wednesday with a right oblique strain in the third inning of a 6-2 defeat. Manager Bob Melvin said Anderson will miss the rest of the regular season and that he doesn't know if he would be available for the playoffs -- if the A's get there.

That added to the recent woes of the starting rotation. Brandon McCarthy suffered a fractured skull when he was hit by a line drive Sept. 5. Now Anderson.

But the A's and Orioles, another unforeseen success, are still the leaders in the wild- card race with records of 85-64. Both have small payrolls and great hopes.

The odds in March on the A's reaching the World Series were as high as 200-1. They had traded their only three All-Stars, all pitchers -- Gio Gonzalez, Trevor Cahill and Andrew  Bailey -- over the winter. "Hard to let guys like that go," Melvin said.

But the guys they got in return, supposedly players who would not help Oakland until 2013 or 2014 -- if they weren't traded -- and the young players  already on the roster developed quickly.

Tommy Milone came from Washington with several  others in exchange for Gonzalez. He's 13-10, the winningest rookie pitcher for  the A's in the 45 seasons they have been in Oakland.

A 26-year-old Cuban, Yoenis Cespedes, signed in February for $36 million for four years, seemingly an outrageous sum for a team with the second-lowest payroll in the majors. It appears to have been money well spent, because Cespedes is batting .293 and is second to Angels phenom Mike Trout among AL rookies  in runs (59), hits (122), doubles (22), homers (19) and RBIs (73).

"I think everybody's outdone what the baseball world's expectations would be," said Melvin, who took control of the A's in June 2011 and is having a ball. Melvin, 50, grew up across the Bay in Menlo Park and played at Cal in Berkeley, a few miles north of the O.Co Coliseum. He went to games and rock concerts at the stadium. He played for the Giants, among other teams, and  managed for Seattle and Arizona.

He says this is special.

"The pride factor of being at home, managing a team you grew up watching," Melvin said, "I don't think you can put a price on that. On top of that, the younger players have made it exciting."

Among them is lefthanded reliever Sean Doolittle, almost 26, who although a pitching star at the University of Virginia was a first-round pick in 2007 by Oakland as a first baseman. After he suffered a knee injury, the A's switched him back to pitcher, where his professional debut came only last fall in the Instructional League.

On July 21 Doolittle (1-0, 3.35 ERA) came in to pitch the ninth against the Yankees. He gave up a hit to Alex Rodriguez, then struck out Robinson Cano, Mark Teixeira and Andruw Jones to save a 2-1 win in Oakland.

"How would you expect a guy like Doolittle to come up and do what he's done?" Melvin asked rhetorically.

Pitching has been the key for Oakland, even with the loss of Bartolo Colon, suspended for 50 games in late August for testing positive for testosterone. The A's ERA is 3.50, second to Tampa in the AL. That's a good thing because the A's batting average is .236. Only Seattle is worse.

The A's were 26-35 after games of June 10. Then they had the best July in the majors, 19-5.

"We do have good pitching," Melvin said, "whether starters or the bullpen, and that's been the most consistent part of our team over the course of the season."

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http://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/despite-low-budget-a-s-battling-for-wild-card-1.4023425

Giants are heads, and hats, above the rest of the West

September 20, 2012 by Art Spander in articles, baseball

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO – Hats off. No, hats on. Alex Smith of the 49ers wearing one from the Giants, a dastardly, fineable act according to the uniform police of the NFL. And, in response, Bruce Bochy sitting pre-game in the Giants’ dugout topped by a 49er hat.

Tit for tat. Or, literally, hat for hat.

"Our way of saying thanks,’’ Bochy would point out. “And we’re 1-0 with that hat.’’

The Giants were sending a message. Specifically, two messages: One, we’ve got your back, 49ers. (Or should that be we’ve got your hat?) And two, we’ve almost got the division, Dodgers.

It’s over, the National League West race, even though technically it’s not, and so even if the Giants absolutely couldn’t blow it, they’re saying all the right things about not easing up.

More significantly, they’re doing all the right things to prove they’re not easing up. Instead, they’re revving up.

They clubbed the Colorado Rockies, 9-2, Thursday afternoon at AT&T Park, a sweep of the four-game series, an eighth win in the last nine games.

These are party days at the ballpark, from the pre-game organ solos – just like in the 1950s – to Pablo Sandoval rediscovering the home run to the seventh-inning Beatles’ recording of “Twist and Shout,’’ one of the great rock songs anywhere, anytime.

"Every single day, 41,000 people excited for us,’’ said Sandoval a short while after the one single day in his career in which he hit home runs both righthanded (in the first with no one on) and lefthanded (in the fourth with two on).

"We play hard for them.”

They’re playing hard and well and entertainingly. The unassailable idea that sport is intended to be tumultuous merriment is carried to the max every game at AT&T, where there’s laughter in the dugout and rejoicing in the stands.

At the so-called old man’s game, the crowds are young and joyful, singing, dancing, cheering.

"We are happy, not satisfied,’’ said Sandoval, the Panda. Until Wednesday, he hadn’t hit a home run in weeks, 161 at bats going back to July. Now he’s hit three in two games.

"We are loose and having fun.’’ He stopped momentarily. “But it’s not over yet.’’

Yes it is. Before the Dodgers played the Nationals, Thursday night, the Giants’ magic number was four, meaning any combo of four Giants wins and Dodgers losses would make San Francisco champions of the West. You think that’s not going to happen?

Bochy, managing his hat off – or on – was asked if he would watch the Dodgers-Nats game.

"No,’’ he answered. “I’m probably going to have dinner, to be honest with you.’’

There’s a man with perspective. A man with intelligence, not that we weren’t previously aware. A night off in the City by the Bay — why waste it watching a ball game?

He’d already been involved in a rewarding one.

Already had seen Barry Zito pitch well enough often enough to get the victory and, when he was removed in the sixth – “He hates it when I come out there,’’ said Bochy -- to get a standing ovation.

Had seen Marco Scutaro, the pickup of the year, at age 36 set a career season mark with his 175th hit (he added another) and raise his batting average to .301.

Had seen the Giants bat around and score six runs in the fourth, when Sandoval and Buster Posey hit back-to-back home runs and Zito had a fine sacrifice bunt that drew an appreciative cheer from a turnout as into the nuances of baseball as it was the taste of the garlic fries.

"The mood, tempo and spirit of the club are very good,’’ said Bochy. “That’s the way it’s been for a couple months. We did a great job on the road. Now we’re playing well here. This club has a lot of character. We’re having fun, keeping it loose.’’

Why be uptight when Matt Cain is zooming along, when Tim Lincecum appears to finding his immediate past, when Buster Posey, the presumptive MVP, is batting .335, when the Panda has found his stroke, when Barry Zito, the man the public despised, has a 13-8 record and receives standing o’s?

"The crowd and that enthusiasm,’’ Bochy said. “The adrenaline. We run on it. These guys feed off that. They’re (the fans) as happy for our success as we are.”

You need to win in sports, and the Giants the past few years have been winning. But there’s more. There’s the realization by management that people want to have a good time, and in the majors’ best ballpark, they must. Or there wouldn’t have been 159 consecutive announced sellouts.

You have to tip your hat to them, no matter if it says 49ers or Giants.

RealClearSports: Of Suspensions and Racing Yachts

August 24, 2012 by Art Spander in articles, baseball, sailing

By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com

SAN FRANCISCO — What do expect? We've got Napa Valley to the north and Silicon Valley to the south. We've got a billionaire, Larry Ellison, who couldn't buy the Golden State Warriors, so he bought the Hawaiian island of Lanai.

Are you surprised it seems like virtually everybody who plays ball around here has been suspended for using performance-enhancing drugs?