Billy Beane made some great trades to bolster his Relief Core – and rotation for the 2014 year. Despite 3 of the slated Opening Day starters not currently with the club due to Tommy John Surgeries (Griffin and Parker) + Straily (Optioned to the Minors), added with early Bullpen woes, the team has righted the ship, and lead AL pitchers in collective ERA, (OBP and OPS against). Beane has allocated just around $34 MIL in players salary to his staff in 2014. He also made great judgement calls on departing pitcher Bartolo Colon, Brett Anderson and Grant Balfour – not duplicating key roles in the previous two seasons. Once again the “Moneyball Man” looks like he may come up roses one more year in the Division at least.

Billy Beane knows how to construct a Pitching Staff on a shoe string budget.

Not enough Pitching with double TJ Surgeries to A.J. Griffin and Jarrod Parker to have slowed the Rotation? Nope.

What about the loss of Bartolo Colon?  Hell no, that big guy is sporting an ERA of over 5.50 in an easier NL hitting league.

Scott Kazmir a risk?  Nope, wrong answer again thus far. The recipient of a 2 YRs Deal worth $22 MIL is a lot of money doled out from the A’s organization for a Free Agent Hurler.

All the 30 Year Old LHP has done in 2014, is lead the AL with a WHIP of 0.974, carried forth a 5 – 1 record, and a sparkling 2.28 ERA to date.

How about sophomore Sonny Gray having a tougher time peddling through the league for a second time?  Not a chance.

Gray is 3rd in the AL – with an ERA of 2.17, and has a 4 – 1 record himself.

Scott Kazmir revived his career in 2013, by going 10 – 9, with a 4.04 ERA in his 29 Game Starts for the Cleveland Indians in 2013. What is better for the A’s – is that the 30 Year old, fanned 162 batters – and only yielded 47 Walks in his 158.0 IP worth of work. His WHIP of 1.323 was his best result since his 2008 season with the Rays. Kazmir may have been a bit of a risk at 2 YRs/$22 MIL, however he is Left Handed, was a smaller year risk than most pitchers will warrant, and the A’s did not have to surrender any asset.  Kazmir has been even better in 2014, with  5 – 1 record, a 2.28 ERA – and has a league best WHIP of 0.974 through 8 Game Stats and 51.1 IP.  The LHP has fanned 42 batters, while only surrendering 9 Walks.

Trouble for Depth with the injuries and a demotion for Dan Straily?  Negative..

Jesse Chavez, a journeyman 30 Year Old Pitcher, who Beane obtained via purchase from the Blue Jays in August of 2012, is 3rd in AL WHIP (1.01) and is 7th in ERA at 2.44.

That is 3 Starting Chuckers who are in the top 7 ERA, and 2 of the top 3 WHIP guys.

The much maligned Bullpen earlier in the year, for a handful of Blown Saves split between Jim Johnson, Luke Gregerson and Sean Doolittle, now holds the best Relief Core ERA in the AL at 2.75.

This team is playing Money Ball on both ends of the spectrum.

While the offense is turning out quality AB, Walking with high OBP – and obliterating baseballs into orbit, the Pitching Staff is whiffing guys on the other end, and barely yielding many Free Passes to 1st in the process.

The A’s have also only given up 30 HRs as a total team, which only trails the Indians and Tigers for teams with fewer.

Please not that Detroit has given up a league best of 24 HRs, along with Cleveland, but the Tigers have also played 5 fewer games than Oakland, and Cleveland has played one less contest.

Perhaps the best indicator how good the Athletics have been as a pitching unit comes in OPS allowed.

The club is operating at .615 OPS against, and the 2nd place Angels are 61 PTS away at .676 for 2nd best.

With that lower number, represents Oakland also only surrendering a .284 OPS as a staff.

The team has also conducted themselves for most of the year without Veteran Reliever Ryan Cook, who has played a vital role in late inning run prevention for the last 2 seasons.

The latest resurrection project comes in the form of Drew Pomeranz.  The LHP was acquired in a deal for Brett Anderson before the season began.

Beane is smart on this one, as it also gave the organization depth for the Rotation.  It is now needed with the club Optioning Dan Straily to Sacramento.

Pomeranz, once hailed as a can’t miss prospect in the Indians franchise, was traded to the Rockies as part of a deal for Ubaldo Jimenez.

The thin air in Denver was not conducive to the man, as he put forth a record of 4 – 14, with a 5.20 ERA in parts of 3 seasons with the club.

So far in 2014, he has a 2 – 1 record, with an impressive 1.45 ERA – seeing work as a Reliever and as a Starter.

In his 1st start of the campaign. the 25 Year Old Pomeranz only allowed 2 Hits, and allowed zero walks while fanning 5.

The A’s are 24 – 15 this year, are currently on a 5 game winning streak, and hold a 3.5 Games lead on 2nd place Seattle, and 4 Games lead on both the Angels and Rangers.

Winning is not something new either, for the back to back AL West Champs of 2012 and 2013.

Since the beginning of play in 2012, they are 214 – 149 (.590 Win %).

The best part about this Pitching Staff, is that they really don’t have many guys who make huge $.

The highest paid chuckers are Jim Johnson and Scott Kazmir.  Johnson’s is a Free Agent after the 2014 year, and Kazmir will hit the open market in 2016.

Billy Beane knows all too well what having pitchers on the books for the long term can do to you.

In the case with Parker and Griffin,  these guys are not making vast amounts of money while they recover from Tommy John Surgery.

It is only a matter of time before a big name pitcher tears his UCL – and will be earning megabucks on the sideline in the 12 – 18 month recovery time.

Beane realized long ago that the best value in your team is spending $ on your offensive side.

He is not opposed to bring in a Free Agent Pitcher as he did with Ben Sheets all those year ago, and recently in other seasons with Bartolo Colon (which worked), and now has done the same with Kazmir.

Even though it never worked out with Sheets for the initial deal, it showed the savvy of the A’s GM.  By going after Free Agents that don’t require compensation in return. Beane never loses the A’s assets of the organization.

he money spent is all that might be lost, and he is a great budget guy to begin with.

It most certainly worked in spades with Colon’s 2012 and 2013 years having forked out only $5 MIL.

The ‘Bullfrog’ behemoth was 28 – 15, with a 2.99 ERA for his tenure in Oakland, and was able to mentor a lot of the young hurlers.  Heading into a 40 year season. the A’s GM bet on Colon not to repeat his ace like stuff.

Beane was also right on when to walk way from Tim Hudson, Barry Zito and Mark Mulder.

These assessments have armed him with all of the knowledge he knows in going forward.

Last winter, he orchestrated a bevy of moves to reconstruct his Bullpen, in which he acquired Gregerson, Johnson, Pomeranz, Fernando Abad, Josh Lindblom (came over with Craig Gentry), and all he had to forfeit the other way was: Michael Choice, Seth Smith, Brett Anderson (currently hurt with Colorado) John Wooten, Jemile Weeks, Chris Bostick.

Most of the players returning have not fared well with the exception of Seth Smith. Brett Anderson has been hurt for Colorado. Anderson currently sits on the 60 Day DL for Colorado (broken index finger).

Jemile Weeks has only garnered 11 AB with Baltimore, and Wooten/Bostick are still in the Minors.

Meanwhile Abad has been a breath of fresh air in the late innings, serving up an incredible 1.23 ERA and 0.477 WHIP – based on fanning 16 batters and only giving up 1 Walk on the season in 14.2 IP.

Lindblom is down on the farm in Sacramento, stretching his arm out to be a Starter in case the club needs him.

Gregerson has blown a couple of Saves, but he has only allowed 19 runners over the 19 Innings he has logged, carrying an ERA of just 2.37.  He is a better setup man than a Closer.

The 2013 Closer (Grant Balfour), has a ballooned ERA of 5.02, a WHIP of 1.535, has blown Saves, and is costing the Rays $12 MIL over two years for his 36 and 37 Year Old Services.

Smith has played extremely well for the Padres, with a .995 OPS (17 XBH, 3 HRs, 3 – 3B, 11 – 2B) on the season, but the A’s have several bat benches in John Jaso and Gentry anyway – that are producing nice OPS’s.

Craig Gentry has a nice .366 OBP, and has scored 15 runs in 27 GP.  Add in 6 SB, and the ability to play the OF for Coco Crisp and Yoenis Cespedes, and it is another good looking player trade for the A’s.

Jaso is at .288/.383/.463 for the campaign – and just hit HRs in back to back games on the weekend, including a walkoff Roundtripper versus the Washington Nationals at o.co Coliseum.

This Pitching Staff makes about $34 MIL combined for the entire lot, and that is with Kazmir, Johnson and Gregerson eating up the majority of that total.

The team signed Eric O’Flaherty, who could be back around the ALL – Star Break, and will provide even more depth down the stretch in 2014 as a Left Handed Reliever with a winning pedigree.

The best part about the Staff (payroll wise) is that Cook, Doolittle, Scribner, Abad, Pomeranz, Millone, Chavez, Straily, Parker, Griffin, Gray and Rodriguez all will make about the Entry Level Minimum this season.

The entire payroll Oakland has for its Pitchers is not much more than Clayton Kershaw, Cliff Lee, Felix Hernandez and Justin Verlander all make in their 2014 contracts by themselves,

Beane looks like he made out like a bandit in the night with the latest offseason transactions.

Jesse Chavez was purchased from the Toronto Blue Jays in Aug of 2012. Having been pressed into the rotation once Parker and Griffin went out for the season with TJ Surgery, Chavez has been brilliant. So far he has authored a 3 – 1 record, with a 2.44 ERA (7th IN AL). His WHIP is also 3rd in the AL, trailing only teammate Kazmir and the Yankees Ace Masahiro Tanaka. At age 30, he and Kazmir are the oldest Starting Pitchers of the bunch.  Prior to this season, the RHP had an ERA well over 5 for his career, and he was toiling up and down in the Minors for much of the last 3 years.

*** The views and opinions expressed in this report are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of mlbreports.com and their partners***

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