Matt Cain and Eric Chavez
Posted By Jeff Fletcher on June 15, 2009 9:17 am
Normally whenever I write about the Giants and A’s on FanHouse, I post links here, but I plum forgot this weekend.
On Saturday, I had a story about Matt Cain and how he’s actually improved, beyond simply getting more run support. I Tweeted after yesterday’s game that I think Cain will be the NL All-Star starter. It would be cool because St. Louis is actually the closest MLB city to Memphis, where Cain grew up. I asked Cain about that the other day, and he said he never actually went to any games in St. Louis as a kid.
On Sunday, I wrote about Eric Chavez’s latest surgery. I used the opportunity of the beginning of the end of Chavez’s career to revisit the decision to sign Chavez, rather than Miguel Tejada, to a long-term deal. At the time, I think it was the right decision, even though it looks bad now.
isn’t hindsight wonderful?
Tejada was probably my favorite player on the 2000-2003 A’s. At the time I wished that the A’s would have at least explored what kind of hometown discount that Tejada was willing to accept. Also, I wondered whether the great shortstop prospect Bobby Crosby could be converted to third base, if they lost Chavez….
I think the A’s probably weren’t interested in making any sort of long-term commitment to Tejada, even if he’d signed for $50 million instead of $72 million (which would have been a huge hometown discount). They probably suspected that he was older than his listed his age and/or that he’d used steroids. Weigh those two things against Tejada’s “gritty 100 percent effort” and you can’t blame them for staying away from Tejada. The only thing Chavez had going against him was some borderline self-esteem issues. I’m not saying it was a no-brainer to pick Chavez over Tejada, but the preponderance of the evidence certainly led you in that direction.
Good points, yet the A’s did negotiate with Giambi for a six year deal worth around $90 milliom…and if they suspected PEDs for Tejada I have a hard time believing they wouldn’t have suspected the same for Giambi.
I am skeptical how much the A’s really “negotiated” that whole Giambi thing. I believe the whole thing was a show. The A’s didn’t really want to commit that much money to Giambi and Giambi didn’t really want to say with the A’s. He wanted to see what it was like to be a Yankee, or at least to see what he could get on the open market.
Do you really think that something as small as a full no-trade clause vs. a partial one could scuttle a whole deal, especially since Giambi would have gotten it automatically by being a 10-5 guy in the third year of the contract?
I agree with you on the Giambi negotiations. I still wish the A’s had at least explored the possibility of keeping Tejada, in view of how important he was to the team at that time.
The A’s did not internally have an option for Chavez like they did with Tejada. In hindsight that option was Bobby Crosby but at that time he looked like he was going to be a very good player.
Additionally, Chavez was at the time the best defensive third baseman in all of baseball, and a left handed power threat.
wsn’t Mark Teahan already in the A’s system before they signed the Chavez extension?
Teahan was the guy behind Chavez but the A’s were not high on him. He actually improved quite a bit after getting traded, but although he had the one good year he’s been pretty pedestrian since and obviously doesn’t have the pop to play corner infield.
The ceiling for Crosby was seen as much higher and I think that factored into the decision as well.