NEWSFLASH - the A's are about team!

you're on the a's sigh-line,
lets take the next caller...

I know I know,
i felt sick when i found the article on sfgate.com -
it was a few minutes after it was announced (4p thursday),
and i had to eat after that, because my stomach dropped and i felt nauseous.
the same thing happened to me when haren was traded earlier this off-season,
but that time it was being rumored for a long time coming,
whereas this was out of nowhere,
the throw-up uppercut that is, the face of your team being traded.
i think i should stay away from the online sf chronicle -
this keeps happening to me,
and read more oakland trib. online-
i'm sure i'd feel better about my a's and my bowels...

so how do i feel about it now,
after a day to digest?

1. swisher is the face of the company, or was, so this hurts alot.

2. swisher himself was trying not to hurt,
saying he was happy and probably a little proud that another team wanted him so badly.

3. the inverse of that is that the a's didn't want him as much,
or enough to keep him, meaning

4. the a's are all about teamwork and team-results.
No one, even a great guy like the Swish,
is big enough to fight the league off himself,
and as sad as it is when a popular piece gets traded away,

5. it's gonna be great in 2-4 years,
when someone hits a homer, or strikes someone out,
we'll be saying "yup, we got that guy in the haren/swisher trade!
the way we were proud of haren, calero,
or daric barton just coming up now,
all traded for mark mulder back a thousand A's years ago, and

6. in the beane way,
the mulder trade will have resulted in
3+6=9 great players when the new guys pan out.

that's like saying you traded an old half-broken ferrari
for a new porsche and a new hybrid,
and then traded the porsche after 2 yrs
for a new hybrid suv, a wind-powered glider,
a new-school schoolbus,
a flying flame-throwing hybrid autogyro helicopter,
a wind-turbine for making your own electricity,
five shares in microsoft b-level stock options,
and the keys to your own isthmus/land-bridge/atoll, i think.
that's a hell of a deal, even if you're a mac user.

i guess what i'm trying to say is that,
no matter how bad it looks on the surface,
beane is looking out for the team.
one known quantity,
for tons and tons of potential,
the Giants do the opposite all the time,
and that's why Ray Durham still has a job
(which isn't a good thing
for anything but Mrs. Durham).

i should know,
being raised on the wrong side of the bay.

i got to see the best player of his era (w/ or w/o the 'roids),
some times playing alongside a worldseries contender team,
and some times playing alongside my 12-yr-old little league teammates,
and in both situations, he was promoted as a one-man-show.

in actuality, bonds was 'just one of the guys' when they were winning,
because he always bats 3rd, 4th, or 5th,
not all three at once.
the beauty of baseball is that no matter how good someone is,
there's still 8 other guys to hit the ball to,
8 other guys up to hit in any given situation,
that everyone gets a turn,
that you just can't give it to the hot hand (basketball),
or the hot receiver (football),
or keep the ball yourself (both sports),
but that you HAVE to share,
and that everyone has to put up for your team to get going,
which is the direction the A's are going.

They're trading one star to get 3-6 real potentials.
They did that with Mulder,
and Barton looks like he could be the real deal,
in addition to pretty good 2006 Calero,
and Ace Haren himself, from 2006-7
which is how it should be.
because,

we'll grow to love the new guys -
swisher was a new guy once.
so was mulder, hudson, giambi, tejada, mcgwire, all of 'em.
that's the beauty of baseball.
its older than all of us, and it will keep going,
because it's the best, it transcends time;
the game has no clock.
the game draws you in because it looks simple,
and then it gets more and more complex
until we're looking at the political and practical implications of trading off a long-haired laughing ball of energy from west virginia by way of ohio state.

so although the Oakland Athletics Baseball Club doesn't look like a worthwhile investment of your entertainment dollars,
they are!

i think it is going to be worth
going out to the ol' coleslaw-asee-um
!because!
its the repeat of the giants moving out of candlestick!

there were always tickets at the 'stick,
$10 bleacher, cheap eats, dumpy seats,
easy to sneak down to,
great players and great views,
always there the day of the game -
"wanna go see the cardinals?" you ask a friend
"yea! Mcgwire for BP!" they say,
and two to ten seats
just as easy as the drive down there,
3 hours of fun,
barry and kent and joe carter that one year,
and then they moved,
and they "arrived"
in the san francisco cosmopolitan hipster nightlife cool-to-be-there crowd...

now pacbell/att/overpriced park,
*no batting practice viewing,
because they don't open that early.
*tickets, ya got 'em?
only if they're below .500 in August or September.
*beer? $8.00 for Bud Light. 'dogs? open your bank account.
one time a buddy of mine bought us dogs and beers,
I think he had to work the next week to pay that one off.
and then the worst part!
*fans? not anyone you remember from the last park -
you think they'll keep a section of the bleachers open for the drummer boyz?
not if they're working on making a profit instead.
*cheering?
a friend of mine has funny stories of little-ol'-ladies shushing their friends for cheering too loudly.
another friend of mine has horror stories of being subject to ejection from the park for cheering too loudly.
at Candlestick or the Coliseum?
you get horror stories from wearing the other team's jersey!

we should go and enjoy easy seats and cheap eats while we can!
we should enjoy the days of sitting all together and
shoving each other when we make snide remarks
or throw things at redsox fans and then have to hide,
because one ticket for upper deck
and a separate one for your buddy to sit in the bleachers
and then your friend was late and got standing-room-only
all for the same high-high price?!
that's not a fun place to be.
sniff.
i've already been through it once.
it will never be as fun as it is right now.
the present.
the glory days of oakland bleacher-dom.
please, join me and bask in this sunlight while we still can...


Swisher gone is sad,
it hurts my stomach,
and makes me wish for the glory days we all had,
rooting for the Western-Division Champion Oakland Athletics.
but Mr. Beane was already looking past that,
that was the victory for him,
and he was already planning the victories to come.
we were basking, he was haggling.
i'm pretty damn proud to have him as our general manager,
who else slays the dragons that are other teams' farm systems?
who else can clean other teams' houses and laugh all the way home?
he's brought us so many greats that we were and still are proud of,
more than any giant fan or even yankee or redsox fan can claim.
just because he has to let them go,
who can say that they've been at the same job for five years lately?
who's been at the same job even ten years?
and all of us have a parent that has/had been at the same job for
ten, twenty, even thirty years?!
times are changing, and so are sports times.
players that play their whole careers with one team are so rare now,
and its definitely not because they're not good enough to.
alot of my buddies wonder why i like the a's, and then the tigers, and then the japanese tigers-
try to stick with just one team,
and i bet your stomach hurts alot more often than mine.

thanks for being such a good fan,
that you rub your tummy as you read
and wish for better baseball days ahead.

JN / LT