Ellis Injury:
He is average offensively, but using De Podesta's defensive rating system he is at an elite level defensively. So it will hurt. But I think between Scutaro and German and Menechino and McLemore the A's have some pretty good replacements, and it won't be a huge loss.

 

i wonder if they will ever get past the first round though...they always seem strong and capable of making the playoffs but no matter what they cant make it past the first round...either too many mistakes or bad luck of the draw, but i still think like last year the could have easily taken out boston...oh wells hopefully this year will be different.

 

A's rule... I went to the game today and they lost 2-1. its all good though. we should all have a huge tailgate party one of these days. the season just started so keep it in mind...

 

That would be sweet, Subie tailgate. If we go general admission bleachers we could all sit together too.

 

Hell ya, I'd do a A's game for sure

BTW the comment about Ellis's defense is true, he is a VERY solid second baseman. He doesnt have super range, but anything within his range is gobled up. The A's havent had a solid 2nd baseman like him for awhile.

 

Paul De Podesta (former A's assistant GM, now LA Dodgers GM) was Billy Beane's main man for sabermetric (statistical performance analysis) research & development. He created a lot of tools that the A's use to evaluate players' actual performance instead of just looking at their appearance and skills like in traditional scouting. That's why we've had guys like Bradford or Stairs who don't "look" like good athletes but are great ballplayers. That's also why the A's value OBP over all other offensive stats, because if you do a "scientific" analysis of baseball, it turns out this is the number one thing that puts runs on the board. De Podesta was Beane's "guy with a laptop" who tracked all this stuff.

Anyways the offensive side is pretty well understood, but defensive performance analysis is still in the dark ages. So one of the things De Podesta created was a defensive rating system which estimates how many runs a fielder saves or costs the team, and Ellis is apparently off the charts on this system, which is why he's an Athletic. It's funny, because like you, I don't subjectively see him as having great range. But that's what De Podesta and Beane have been trying to do, take the subjectivity out of player evaluation and come up with objective quantitative answers.

 

Giants > As

 

fixed it for ya

 

Los Gigantes should win a world series or 4 before they run any smack. A's have major scoreboard over the battery chuckers.

 

SHARKS ARE GONNA WIN TONITE!!!!

 

AND THEY DID!!!! 1-0 in OT

 

Yeah that's great... take it to the hockey thread...