Speaker 1: I think that they are out in the community a
Speaker 1: little bit as opposed to, you know, hiding from the
Speaker 1: community like they had the last couple of years in Oakland.
Speaker 2: Is certainly have changed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, here we go.
Speaker 4: Melissa Lockard from the Athletic covers the a's among other things.
Speaker 4: Great to have you on the show as we're going
Speaker 4: to run through some storylines Melissa, which we'll get to
Speaker 4: in just a moment. I just wanted to get your
Speaker 4: thoughts real quick overall. Are you surprised we're having you
Speaker 4: on and actually talking about a few decent moves for
Speaker 4: the athletics?
Speaker 3: Like I'm trying to look at it a little bit
Speaker 3: half full.
Speaker 4: Obviously, you and I, you know, we saw each other
Speaker 4: last year around this time at fans Fest. The Oakland
Speaker 4: situation aside, this franchise itself hasn't really been competitive for
Speaker 4: the last few years.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, there's sort of
Speaker 1: has been an ebb and flow in terms of how
Speaker 1: the franchise has operated over the last I don't know,
Speaker 1: twenty five years or so. Were you'll see a concentration
Speaker 1: of years where they are competitive and then a concentration
Speaker 1: of years where they're not, And I think from a
Speaker 1: player development standpoint, they're starting to enter that window of
Speaker 1: where they would be competitive, So you know, it makes
Speaker 1: sense that they'd be adding. Obviously, being back on revenue
Speaker 1: sharing and having to spend that money has allowed them
Speaker 1: to actually sign a few players on the open market.
Speaker 1: But it doesn't shock me that they would be trying
Speaker 1: to improve and not sell off at this stage, just
Speaker 1: given sort of what their pattern has been in terms
Speaker 1: of player development in the past.
Speaker 4: Okay, so let's get into the details. And I tried
Speaker 4: to use a little bit of humor along the way.
Speaker 4: So let's hit our twenty twenty five storylines for the Athletics.
Speaker 4: I am, by no means a writer with my full
Speaker 4: time job here, Melissa, but let me know how I did.
Speaker 3: So.
Speaker 4: First off, we're going to say goodbye Oakland, John Fisher
Speaker 4: can't wait to watch Aaron Judge Mash and Sacramento. How
Speaker 4: are they going to draw in the capital of California.
Speaker 4: We've got daddy money or the A's are forced to
Speaker 4: spend some of that money which we referred to. You
Speaker 4: got to get at least to about the one oh
Speaker 4: five mil number Brent Rooker got paid. And is there
Speaker 4: an underdog story involved. Can this team actually make a
Speaker 4: postseason run and set up the dream matchup that we're
Speaker 4: all looking for, the Rays and the A's in the
Speaker 4: ALCS in a battle of minor league ballparks. So, Melissa,
Speaker 4: let's start at the top here and get your thoughts
Speaker 4: on the first storyline, which is the A's moving to Sacramento.
Speaker 4: For now, how do you think this is going to
Speaker 4: play out for not just the area, but also for
Speaker 4: the team and for opponents dealing with what is a
Speaker 4: minor league environment, even though they did obviously make some
Speaker 4: renovations and they're still doing that to try and polish
Speaker 4: it up and making a little bit less you know,
Speaker 4: minor league ish, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, you know it is what it is, right.
Speaker 1: It's a stadium that cannot be bigger than what is
Speaker 1: out there. So you've got I think four teen thousand
Speaker 1: is its capacity, and I think they probably will draw
Speaker 1: around that most nights, right, Like, I think there is
Speaker 1: an excitement in the area to have a major league team.
Speaker 1: I think you know, they're going to have a fairly
Speaker 1: full ballpark. What that means for the experience for the
Speaker 1: players when you're still looking at it as a Triple
Speaker 1: A ballpark, you know, I think remains to be seen,
Speaker 1: and obviously those guys will be able to tell us
Speaker 1: as it comes. But there is some you know, local
Speaker 1: excitement there in Sacramento. There's definitely been some interesting moves.
Speaker 1: I think taking Stomper or the elephant anyway off of
Speaker 1: the uniforms and replacing it with a Sacramento patch but
Speaker 1: not actually calling them the Sacramento Athletics is an interesting move.
Speaker 1: Sort of having your cake and eating it too in
Speaker 1: some ways, you know. And I think you know that
Speaker 1: that they are out in the community a little bit
Speaker 1: as opposed to, you know, hiding from the community like
Speaker 1: they had the last couple of years in Oakland is
Speaker 1: certainly a change. So I'm sure it'll be a honeymoon
Speaker 1: period there. What happens in year two or three I
Speaker 1: think will be a lot more interesting than what happens
Speaker 1: the first year.
Speaker 5: How are these trades and free agents that they have
Speaker 5: signed payoff? Because you know, if we're talking about a
Speaker 5: playoff team, these are the guys that have to be
Speaker 5: at the center of it. And John Fisher all of
Speaker 5: a sudden came up with some money that he just
Speaker 5: mysteriously didn't have in a much larger market.
Speaker 1: Well, he came up with the other owner's money, I
Speaker 1: think is the main thing. You know, it just got
Speaker 1: back on revenue sharing, so you know, I mean, I
Speaker 1: think they are a better team than they were at
Speaker 1: this time last year. I don't think there's any doubt
Speaker 1: about that. They've got a little bit more veteran depth
Speaker 1: in the starting rotation. I still think they need more.
Speaker 1: I'm surprised they haven't been the team that's bought Jordan
Speaker 1: Montgomery's contract yet with that remaining amount of money, But
Speaker 1: they certainly have more stability there. They have some younger
Speaker 1: guys who could, you know, kind of help at the
Speaker 1: back end of that rotation. Ken Waldachuk coming back from
Speaker 1: Tommy John surgery. And you know, that offense was starting
Speaker 1: to gel a little bit this year, and they're moving
Speaker 1: into a ballpark that will help their offense even more. So,
Speaker 1: you know, you're you're looking at the main guys still
Speaker 1: being Brent Brooker, still being Lawrence Butler. You know the
Speaker 1: development of Tyler Soderstrom and Zach Geloff. Shay Langeleier is
Speaker 1: probably going to get thirty five forty homers with that ballpark.
Speaker 1: To play in, you know, so that that's kind of
Speaker 1: where their core is. But adding more stability to the
Speaker 1: rotation certainly will help.
Speaker 2: All right, How nice was it to see Brent Rooker
Speaker 2: get paid? I know he's been on here a bunch
Speaker 2: of times with us. I'm happy for him. This guy,
Speaker 2: if you don't know, his story, was a high draft pick,
Speaker 2: sec triple crown out Mississippi State, goes kind of bounces
Speaker 2: around team the team, never really gets a chance, gets
Speaker 2: to go to the Athletics. We call him the Aths
Speaker 2: on here by the way, because they you know, they're
Speaker 2: not Sacramento, they're not Oakland. Who knows where they're going
Speaker 2: to play? So he gets to the Aths. He has
Speaker 2: a couple of nice years, he has an unbelievable year
Speaker 2: last year, and he gets paid. So how happy are
Speaker 2: we that Brent Rooker finally got paid and he was
Speaker 2: He's now kind of the face of the franchise.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, I mean I think that was the no brainer
Speaker 1: move of the offseason if you were the A's front office.
Speaker 1: I mean, here's a guy who is not only their
Speaker 1: best player, but also a huge influence in that clubhouse.
Speaker 1: He is the veteran leadership there I don't think there's
Speaker 1: any reason to think that he won't continue to be
Speaker 1: that player for the next couple of years. And you know,
Speaker 1: if you're Brent Rooker, it made all the sense in
Speaker 1: the world to take that money too, because he is older.
Speaker 1: He was older when he signed out of college. You know,
Speaker 1: it took him a while to get established. Now he's
Speaker 1: guaranteed for life with that money. But he also knows
Speaker 1: that the Ace do have a history of if they
Speaker 1: aren't going to pay the player anymore, they have done
Speaker 1: a good job of trading players to places where their
Speaker 1: careers take off. So I don't think there's the downside
Speaker 1: for either side really in that deal. And I am
Speaker 1: really happy for a guy that worked as hard as
Speaker 1: he did to turn himself into the player that he
Speaker 1: is to get that money.
Speaker 5: Is there a chance that we see Rais and the
Speaker 5: Atchs in the playoffs? Maybe more so the ath Is
Speaker 5: we're talking about now, And we even asked Rooker this
Speaker 5: the other day when he was on Will they allow
Speaker 5: him to play in Sacramento if they make the playoffs?
Speaker 1: I believe they've said no. I believe that the contingency
Speaker 1: plan has been for both of those teams to have,
Speaker 1: you know, somewhere else to play in the playoffs. I
Speaker 1: don't know if there's been like an official official announcement,
Speaker 1: but I think that's what we've heard. The interesting thing
Speaker 1: would be if you did have a playoff series in
Speaker 1: one of those minor league parks for that team, could
Speaker 1: they outdraw the one wildcard game they played at the
Speaker 1: Coliseum in twenty nineteen And I'm not sure they could
Speaker 1: even if you had a five game series. So, you know,
Speaker 1: I think that's that's an interesting thing. But you know,
Speaker 1: like you look at the AL West right now. You know,
Speaker 1: Houston's still obviously a little bit in flux, but they're
Speaker 1: not better than they were necessarily. The Angels are maybe
Speaker 1: a little bit better, but they have a lot of
Speaker 1: ways to go. The Mariners have done nothing, So you know,
Speaker 1: you're looking at a at a division that is not
Speaker 1: going to be the best in baseball by a long shot.
Speaker 1: So it wouldn't be out of this realm of possibility
Speaker 1: that they could make a run.
Speaker 2: Okay, what you just said, I just can't get my
Speaker 2: head wrapped around it. So if the Aths make the
Speaker 2: post season, they're not gonna play where they played their
Speaker 2: whole season. Why the if not, I don't understand. They
Speaker 2: battled and they went through this whole thing. Same with
Speaker 2: the Rays. So the Rays have all their stuff packed
Speaker 2: away at Steinberg Field. The Aths have it all packed
Speaker 2: away whatever the ballpark's called in Sacramento. No, I don't
Speaker 2: even know River cat Park or whatever it's called, right,
Speaker 2: but they have all their stuff parked away here, packed away,
Speaker 2: and they have all these things, and the promotions the
Speaker 2: fans have been behind them, and then Majorague Baseball is
Speaker 2: gonna say, oh, by the way, great job, guys, You're
Speaker 2: playing your playoff games in San Francisco at the Giants Park.
Speaker 2: That is just ludicrous to me that we would even
Speaker 2: be having this conversation.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's ludicrous that we have two teams playing
Speaker 1: in minor league ballparks when you have at the very
Speaker 1: least one empty major league ready ballpark now. And you know,
Speaker 1: whatever you think of the oakon Colsseum, it's still a
Speaker 1: major league ballpark and it's just sitting there. So there's
Speaker 1: a lot of things that don't make sense, you know,
Speaker 1: especially about the a situation. Obviously, there was you know,
Speaker 1: a natural disaster that impacted the race situation. But you know,
Speaker 1: even there, there's no plan for what happens next for
Speaker 1: the Rays in their stadium situation. I think, you know,
Speaker 1: the A's is far from settled as to what happens
Speaker 1: next after this next year, given what's going on in
Speaker 1: Nevada with their budget situation and the fact that frankly,
Speaker 1: construction costs in California and in Las Vegas are probably
Speaker 1: going to go way up because construction in Los Angeles
Speaker 1: is going to be so intense over the next few years.
Speaker 1: So I don't know what the endgame is for either
Speaker 1: of these franchises, to be honest, but you know, maybe
Speaker 1: they build the floating ballpark off the coast of somewhere
Speaker 1: and that's where both of them will play the postseason series.
Speaker 2: Something. They could play Squid Game, they could play the
Speaker 2: squid games on some random island and just yeah, I mean,
Speaker 2: I don't know who knows what they're going to do.
Speaker 2: But my thing is, I got to ask you this,
Speaker 2: since you brought up Vegas and you know more about
Speaker 2: this than probably any of us on this on this show,
Speaker 2: do what are the chances that the A's actually end
Speaker 2: up in Las Vegas? Because until I see a shovel,
Speaker 2: not the Golden Show all that John Fisher throws over
Speaker 2: his shoulder, and like here we go. I'm talking about
Speaker 2: like beams going in and actual stadium walls being built.
Speaker 2: What are the chances that the aths actually end up
Speaker 2: in Las Vegas.
Speaker 1: I still think it's less than fifty percent. I don't
Speaker 1: feel like we've seen a real rendering, you know, like
Speaker 1: there's there's been sort of little, kind of haphazard renderings
Speaker 1: that we've seen. Maybe there are renderings that exist for
Speaker 1: you know, the companies that would actually build this thing
Speaker 1: that are a lot more detailed. You compare the renderings
Speaker 1: to other park projects that you've seen that actually did
Speaker 1: get done, and even ones that don't, like some of
Speaker 1: the ones in Chicago that frankly are have been a
Speaker 1: lot more impressive than what we've seen, and those are
Speaker 1: like you know, pie in the sky sort of things.
Speaker 1: And yeah, they blew up the casino, but there's no
Speaker 1: building that's taking place there. There's a huge budget deficit
Speaker 1: that's starting in Nevada now, and you know, I don't
Speaker 1: know how they justify giving away money when they have
Speaker 1: to make ends meet for this for the state there,
Speaker 1: and the fact that you know, they're kind of making
Speaker 1: these inroads and stay Aacramento tells me they're not so
Speaker 1: sure either. You know, they're kind of keeping all the
Speaker 1: eggs in the basket that they can because I don't
Speaker 1: think they know what's going to happen next to either.
Speaker 1: So I don't think they've positioned themselves particularly well to
Speaker 1: have moved out of a market that they could have
Speaker 1: stayed in in stasis until they figured out where they
Speaker 1: were going to go to find out what's next.
Speaker 4: There was no better slogan than rooted in Oakland when
Speaker 4: we knew they were desperately trying to leave several years ago.
Speaker 4: That was a Dave Cavel masterpiece who is now gone
Speaker 4: from the team. So good job by him to kind
Speaker 4: of keep his legacy really really strong. Can't wait to
Speaker 4: have him on the show. But Melissa, thank you so
Speaker 4: much for joining us. Appreciate the time everyone give Melissa
Speaker 4: follow if you don't already. Each does a great job
Speaker 4: obviously covering what goes on here, especially on the news
Speaker 4: side too with the athletics.
Speaker 3: Thanks Melissa, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: I appreciate it.
Speaker 4: While we're on the ace since they actually did something
Speaker 4: or did multiple things this offseason, which I'm a.
Speaker 3: Huge fan of. By the way, I want to be
Speaker 3: clear about that.
Speaker 4: It's nice to have the a is playing, you know,
Speaker 4: a little more competitively in the off season, even if
Speaker 4: that's forced a j. Can you now name the and
Speaker 4: Crats the four teams left that have not signed a
Speaker 4: major league free agent?
Speaker 2: Marlins are one. Obviously we got the.
Speaker 4: Course three more one at least one other should be easy.
Speaker 4: Brewers signed somebody, even if it was more low end.
Speaker 4: No Atlanta signed PROFI one. I just talked about one.
Speaker 4: I just talked about very very recently on the show.
Speaker 2: Mariner.
Speaker 4: No Mariners signed Solano Race signed somebody that the team
Speaker 4: I just talked about the Twins Andres Padres are a
Speaker 4: third Twins.
Speaker 3: There's one more and it's just Rockies.
Speaker 2: The rock signed uh.
Speaker 4: And Farmer and some others. One team left that has
Speaker 4: also claimed to be frozen situation, Cardinals, the Saint Louis Cardinals.
Speaker 4: There you go, good job. I mean it's not easy,
Speaker 4: but yeah, that was that's the last four.
Speaker 3: And Crats.
Speaker 4: I can't answer who assigned each one. I didn't do
Speaker 4: the homework like that. But the Brewers have signed somebody,
Speaker 4: even if it was.
Speaker 2: By the way, what can we discuss this? Every writer
Speaker 2: we have on from the Oakland area is like, yeah,
Speaker 2: they're not gonna be in Vegas. I mean everyone we
Speaker 2: ask it is not. There hasn't been one Oakland Bay
Speaker 2: area person it's been like, oh, yeah, they're gonna be
Speaker 2: in Vegas in three years, four years. There hasn't been
Speaker 2: one of them. Every person we've asked been like, it's
Speaker 2: underd fifty percent that the A's are in Vegas in
Speaker 2: three years, four years, five years, ten years on her years.
Speaker 2: It is amazing. So what that was John Fisher doing?
Speaker 2: I don't get it. What Melissa said at the end
Speaker 2: was great. They left a major league ballpark to go
Speaker 2: to a place you can't play playoff games. Now the
Speaker 2: Rays is different because of the hurricane, but the A's
Speaker 2: left the place. And if I just can't get my
Speaker 2: mind around if they make the playoffs, they can't play
Speaker 2: in the stadium that they played in the whole year,
Speaker 2: They're gonna have to go to Montreal. They're gonna have
Speaker 2: to go to where, Like, what do we do here?
Speaker 3: It's crazy, it is. It's a tough look too, Kratz.
Speaker 4: When you know fans are there all year and then
Speaker 4: you're like, root for us to win so that we
Speaker 4: can exit this ballpark for postseason ball.
Speaker 5: It's gonna be a brutal look too. Not many people. No,
Speaker 5: it doesn't playoff. People don't travel home. Team doesn't travel. Well,
Speaker 5: it's not I don't know it. It's gonna be a
Speaker 5: bad look.
Speaker 3: It is a very difficult look.
Speaker 4: Charlie Blackman a special assistant to the regional i mean
Speaker 4: general manager of the Colorado Rockies, which is Bill Schmidt.
Speaker 4: So there you go, little news here with hot corner.
Speaker 4: Just for a couple of minutes. Charlie Blackman goes straight
Speaker 4: from the field to the front office and shocker crats.
Speaker 4: The Rockies like certain people and they keep them in
Speaker 4: their organization forever.
Speaker 3: There is. There is low.
Speaker 4: Loyalty there, more so than you see from almost any organization.
Speaker 5: You laughed about it because I think that's what ham
Speaker 5: strings this team a little bit. Not that, not that
Speaker 5: Charlie Blackman's hamstringing them in the future here, but them
Speaker 5: their inability to hire outside of their group of buddies,
Speaker 5: you know, the beerd Diggers, all those guys together. But
Speaker 5: why would you not have Charlie Blackman come in. Why
Speaker 5: would a team that has a star that's had success
Speaker 5: in your organization not make them a special assistant and
Speaker 5: keep them because he gets to be around the players,
Speaker 5: He gets to tell them about how to handle different
Speaker 5: things that he went through in this city. Like, to me,
Speaker 5: it's a no brainer, and I think it's awesome for him.
Speaker 2: I think it's great for it's great for it's great
Speaker 2: for Charlie Blackman. I agree with what uh Cross just said, though, Like,
Speaker 2: I mean, we need to get some new ideas. If
Speaker 2: you're the Rockies, you got to try something crazy. You
Speaker 2: got to go full raise and just try to do
Speaker 2: something that's so far outside the box that nobody's thought
Speaker 2: about because you haven't had success. You had the one
Speaker 2: year twenty was a twenty two thousand and seven.
Speaker 5: When they went to the World Series because they worked
Speaker 5: oh yeah, yeah, two.
Speaker 2: Thousand and seven. They went to the World Series because
Speaker 2: they went on like an epic, like twenty game winning
Speaker 2: streak at the end of the year out of nowhere.
Speaker 2: And so other than that though, I mean, they've made
Speaker 2: the playoffs a couple of times, they've been okay a
Speaker 2: couple of times, but now you're in the division with
Speaker 2: the Dodgers and the Padres and the Diamondbacks. You got
Speaker 2: to figure something else out if you're the Rockies, and
Speaker 2: the only thing to do is you got to do
Speaker 2: something crazy, and you got to get outside your box. Man.
Speaker 2: You got to think of something just way off the
Speaker 2: wall to try it to set yourselves apart. And then
Speaker 2: you're also gonna have to spend some money.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they're in a tough spot.
Speaker 4: But at least we learned from his little media press
Speaker 4: conference thing or whatever that he can ski now and
Speaker 4: know if he's a skier, but he said he went
Speaker 4: skiing at thirty eight years old for the first time
Speaker 4: in his life. Last week in bail he said, you
Speaker 4: can't ski. It was in my contract. Rocky shouldn't ski.
Speaker 4: Maybe they do need to ski, just to switch things up,
Speaker 4: you know. More power to the legs, right, isn't Isn't
Speaker 4: that what sometimes soft things for a player to get
Speaker 4: get that lower half involved more. No, no warrior exhausted
Speaker 4: from skiing or you get hurt snowboarding and then you
Speaker 4: can't play.
Speaker 5: That's the problem. Hey, hey, j doesn't know anything about skin.
Speaker 5: The don't ski in Florida and you.
Speaker 2: Want to hear a story yes, two thousand and five,
Speaker 2: two thousand and five, and win the World Series. January
Speaker 2: two thousand and six. Right after we win the World Series,
Speaker 2: father in law calls me. He goes, hey, I got
Speaker 2: a great deal to go to Bath and go skiing.
Speaker 2: You want to go? And I was like, yes please.
Speaker 2: I went for three days and went skiing, didn't get hurt,
Speaker 2: stayed on the greens and the blues, don't do the
Speaker 2: black diamonds. When I knew I was falling, I would
Speaker 2: just fall down on my big fat butt, slide down
Speaker 2: the hill a little bit, get up and keep going.
Speaker 2: It was a great time. I did it a couple
Speaker 2: of times in my career. I don't recommend it to
Speaker 2: anybody else doing it because people aren't stupid like me.
Speaker 2: But I skied a couple of times in my career
Speaker 2: even though I was supposed to. I had jet skis
Speaker 2: in my career. I wasn't supposed to do a lot
Speaker 2: of stuff I wasn't supposed to. I don't recommend it.
Speaker 2: Listen to what your contract says, especially if you're making
Speaker 2: a lot of money. But I broke the rules once
Speaker 2: or twice. Hell yeah, that's playing with fire. It's playing
Speaker 2: with fire.
Speaker 5: Brandon Mostows first got his first million dollar contract, millions
Speaker 5: of dollar contracts, and he took a picture on his
Speaker 5: snowboard at the top of a mountain with his wife.
Speaker 5: I texted him that day, I go.
Speaker 2: Bro, take that down. There's no way. He's like, oh,
Speaker 2: good point.