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Notes Unconventional
2005-12-29 11:55
by Ken Arneson

Maury Brown has a profile of Charlie Finley over at Baseball Analysts. Part 1 today, Part 2 soon...check it out.

Oakland sure had its fair share of unconventional characters in my childhood. Finley (who owned two teams in Oakland--the A's and the NHL Seals). The whole Mustache Gang. Al Davis. Franklin Mieuli. Billy Martin. Sandy Alderson (a lawyer running a baseball team?). And of course, Bill King.

A couple of questions come to mind:

  • It seems to me that a bigger deal is made of Moneyball and Billy Beane outside the East Bay than inside it. Perhaps we're just used to the unconventional approach around here?
     
  • Was this embrace of the unusual the chicken or the egg? Was this a precursor of the Silicon Valley innovative spirit in the Bay Area, or an early example of it?
     

* * *

Six former A's on the Hall of Fame ballot: Goose Gossage, Tommy John, Doug Jones, Willie McGee, Dave Parker, and Walt Weiss. Only Weiss spent a big chunk of his career in Oakland. Did you know Weiss had a career .351 OBP? I never would have guessed. He hovered around a .300 OBP for most of his Oakland years. But four years in Colorado will do that for you.

* * *

Some former A's moving around: Johnny Damon to the Yankees, Chad Bradford to the Mets, and Eric Byrnes to the Diamondbacks. I wish them luck in their new homes.

* * *

Kevin Millwood signed with the Rangers. I don't think Millwood is going to be a great pitcher for them, but it does change things in the AL West a bit. Before, when facing the Rangers in a three-game series, you were pretty much guaranteed to face at least one starting pitcher who didn't really belong in a major league rotation. I don't think that's the case anymore. The Rangers may now have five mediocre starting pitchers (Millwood, Padilla, Eaton, Loe, Dominguez), but that's quite an improvement for them. And with the addition of Otsuka in the pen to set up Cordero, I think Texas is going to be much harder to beat.

* * *

All quiet on the Zito front. However, it should be noted that:

  • the latest Manny-to-Mets rumors do not involve Lastings Milledge, and
  • David Wells still has not yet been traded to the West Coast.

Which means to me that Zito's home ballpark in 2006 is still very much in question.

Comments
2005-12-29 13:49:07
1.   Vishal
i'm not sure i'd attribute weiss' improvement ENTIRELY to colorado. after all, he posted a .367 OBP in 500 at-bats in florida the year before he went to colorado, and then 347 at-bats in atlanta after he left coors, he posted a .386 OBP. maybe he somehow just got more patient?
2005-12-29 14:31:58
2.   Ken Arneson
Maybe. Or maybe he was walked a lot batting 8th in front of the pitcher in the NL.
2005-12-29 14:36:16
3.   Bob Timmermann
Weiss had 7 IBBs while playing for Oakland. In his first season in Florida, he was given 13.
Then he went to Colorado in 1994 and got no IBBs that season.
2005-12-29 15:54:24
4.   Ken Arneson
Every single one of Weiss's 31 career NL IBBs came when he batted eighth in the order. He received no IBBs in 1994 because he spent most of that year batting leadoff or second in the order.

His OBP in '94 was only .336, compared to the next three years when he batted eighth, mostly: .403, .381, .377.

2005-12-30 04:42:00
5.   The Mick 536
Problem with Total Baseball. It weighs 12 plus plans. Have trouble moving it around. Spoke with jonh Thorn at a SABR meeting held in Vermont this fall. He said he told the publisher. Problem was they wanted to include color photos. Great pictures. Great stories. Great records. Lots of explanations about the new stats. Also has an expanded history of scoring.

Wiki doesn't always rely on facts.

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