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It started when A’s GM Billy Beane traded super-utility player Marco Scutaro to Toronto for pitchers Kristian Bell and Graham Godfrey last November.  Then in December, he got pitchers Brett Anderson, Dana Eveland and Greg Smith, outfielders Aaron Cunningham and Carlos Gonzalez and infielder Chris Carter allfor Dan Haren.  Thenin January they acquired outfielder Ryan Sweeney and pitchers Gio Gonzalez and Fautino De Los Santos for Nick Swisher.  Later that month, the A’s received pitchers Joey Devine for Jamie Richmond for Mark Kotsay.

In case you lost count, that is 13 players for 4.  Clearly, Beane could not have gotten much in the way of talent too, could he have?  He did.

Eveland is 4-4 (3.82 ERA) and 2nd on the team in innings pitched.  Smith is 3-4 (3.56 ERA) and 3rd on the team in innings pitched.  Devine is 3-0 with 3 holds out of the pen with a 1.23 ERA (not a misprint) in 18 appearances. 

Sweeney has hit .293 and has 22 RBI’s and 15 runs in 46 games.  Gonzalez has only played 7 games with the big club, and while he has hit under.200, all 5 of his hits have been doubles, driving in 5 runs.

 So he got talent too, eh.  No way he got youth.  Wrong.

All three of the pitchers are 24…and they are older than the hitters (Sweeney is 23, Gonzalez 22).

They are cheap too.  None of them are earning even $500,000.

Compare that to what he gave up:

Haren, 27, is 6-4 (3.40 ERA in the NL) and making over $4 million.  In fairness, he is excellent.

Scutaro, 32,  is hitting .267 with 22 RBI’s and 25 runs in 55 games and making over $1.5 million.  Nothing special.

Kotsay, 32, is hitting .295 with 21 runs batted in, playing in 47 games and making over $7 million.  He is currently on the DL with back problems.

Swisher, 27, is hitting .205 with 16 RBI’s in 60 games and making over $3.5 million.  He has been a huge disappointment to the ChiSox.

So if we just look at this trade in the short term, Beane got 5 players for 4, is getting almost as much use out of them (you could make an argument that 2 starters makes what he received better TODAY than what he gave up), and for about $13 million less.  And these trades weren’t made for today.

But really, it didn’t start with the moves in the off-season.  It started when Beane sent Jason Kendall to the Cubs for another catcher, Rob Bowen, last July.  Kendall, who is having a great season defensively, is hitting .245 with 18 RBI’s in 55 games.  Bowen is hitting .258 as the back-up.  Kendall makes over $4 million, Bowen just over $400,000.  The A’s starting catcher, Kurt Suzuki makes less than Bowen and is hitting .260.

Then Beane acquired infielder Jack Hannahan from Detroit.  Then he signed Emil Brown.  He brought Keith Foulke out of retirement.  All three have major roles on the team this year.

Beane also needs to be commended on his low risk, high reward pick-ups in the first 2 months of the season.  Rajai Davis, 27, was cast off across the Bay by the Giants.  He makes near the league minimum, plays great defense, and gives them an element of speed on the bases in late inning, close game situations.  Frank Thomas, 40, was let go by the A’s in the off-season, but re-signed after the Blue Jays signed him to a $12 million deal, and then had to release him.  Thomas gives legitimacy to the middle of the order of a team that is way too young.  Even if he is not vintage Big Hurt, his reputation changes the approach when facing the A’s, and at low cost. 

All of this, and he has created the 2nd youngest roster, and the 3rd lowest team salary.  Oh yeah, they are only 4.5 games behind the Angels and ahead of most of the pre-season favorites for the wildcard.

There will be no miracles for Beane and his A’s this year.  They will fade in August. 

Beane and the A’s will have no need for a miracle in not so long though. 

How good are the D-Backs?  I thought I knew.  Now, I just don’t know.

On May 1, Arizona was enjoying an off day, sitting at 20-8.  The Dodgers were already 5 back and everybody else had lost sight of the D-backs.  Everything was clicking - the pitchers, the hitters, and pitcher Micah Owings had even sparked a win with a pinch hit home run.  Many conceded the NL West that day.  How could anybody compete with the NL runners-up from a season ago?

They came May.  11-17.  What happened?

Some might say that baseball happened.  Those people point out that even the best team loses 54 games, and that success in baseball means responding to struggles.  Those people talk about how humbling the sport is and how this would have happened eventually to any 20-8 team.  There is more to it with this D-back team.

Look at how Arizone got to 20-8:  5-1 vs. Rockies;  4-1 vs. Giants and Dodgers;  4-2 vs. Padres. 

Oh yeah, that is only 17-5.  The Snakes went 3-3 against the Reds and Astros.  And now the pattern should be clear, and the warning alarm sounded.

The D-backs are 20-8 against the West and 9-16 against the rest of the National League (2-1 against a lousy Detroit team in interleague play).  While 20-8 is a great record within your division, and that winning percentage will win a team its division almost single-handedly, this is bad sign for this team, in this division.

Every other team in the NL West has a losing record.  Only the Dodgers are fewer than 10 games under.  Think of it in these terms:  1.) The 2nd placed Dodgers would be in 5th in either of the other 2 NL divisions,  2.) No team in the West has a winning record against any other disivion in the NL,  3.)  The 3 teams at the bottom of the division would ALL be in last place in either of the other NL divisions.  Wow.  That 20-8 doesn’t look so good now.

This next stretch is going to be vital to Arizona if they are to bury their division and find some confidence, or if they are going to hang around .500 and wait for the Rockies or Dodgers to find themselves.  And how intimidating are they going to seem in October if they haven’t beaten a team with a winning record?  We all will be talking about if they will wake up in the post-season.

After today the D-backs start a 10 game road trip (Brewers 3, Pirates 4, Mets 3), then they return home for 6 (KC 3, Oakland 3).  Only 1 of those teams is currently above .500 (the shocking A’s are 2 games over), and two of those teams sit at .500 (Brewers and Mets).  After a month of dreadful play, this has to be the time to take-off. 

Making matters a little more difficult is the serious nature of the injuries to Eric Byrnes.  When was the last time a guy had 2 strained hammies?  They have to treat him with extreme caution.

Still, that rotation should get rolling.  Brandon Webb’s gem yesterday is a great sign after a couple poor outings, but should be taken with a grain of salt because it was against a cellar dwelling Nationals team.  Throw Randy Johnson and Dan Haren in a rotation with that guy, and a team should never lose more than three in a row.  Hell, the bullpen is even tough - closer Brandon Lyon is 12 for 14 in save opportunities with a 1.64 ERA.

But I will look more closely at Arizona’s opponents before I get to excited about how good they are for a while. 

So will their opponents.