Team Review: 1987 Oakands A's

1987 Oakland A’s

Real Life Record: 81-81, 3^rd in the AL West

Notable Players: Mark McGwire, Jose Canseco, Dave Stewart, Reggie Jackson, Dennis Eckersley

This is the inferior version of the A’s teams that went on to have a mini dynasty in the late 80’s/early 90’s.  The Bash Brothers were in place, but still sort of in their infancy.  It was Eck’s first year with the team and he had yet to transform into the moustached dynamo he would become.  It’s also McGwire’s rookie season, when he hit a rookie record 49 home runs.  1988 is when Canseco really broke out and dominated the league. He won the MVP, led the league in home runs and slugging.  He’s still a year away here. 

I think they were doing something illegal. Look at those bats!

They definitely have some power and I expect them to score a bunch of runs, but they are also probably going to give up a ton.  The starting pitching is a mess.  Dave Stewart won 20 games, but his ERA is close to 4. The #2 is C. Young, who unfortunately is Curt not Cy. The #3 and #4 are shaping up to be Steve Ontiveros and Gene Nelson.  Eck started a couple of games for them that season, but I’d like to have him in my pocket for some high leverage situations. They also have some decidedly below average defense all over the field. They have three guys who can play second, and they all have a 4 defense rating.  McGwire is a butcher at first and Tony Philips is a butcher at four positions. It’s really a team of Designated Hitters who are forced to play the field. The bullpen is decent but nothing extraordinary. They lack a real shutdown guy for when it gets dicey. 

The team has a total of 29 cards, but since I am only using 25 man rosters I had to cut four guys from the team.  Those unfortunates are Ron Cey, Mike Gallego, Moose Haas, and the legendary Walking Underwear (Joaquin Andujar). 

I really love that they have the old, broken down Reggie Jackson on this team.  It’s his last year in baseball and well, he pretty much sucked. But hey, it’s the AL. That’s what the DH is for. I’ve always been a fan of Reggie and I suspect that I will give him way more playing time than he deserves. The first time he struts up to the plate and swats a pinch hit home run will make this whole season worth it.  He actually is halfway decent against righties and platoons with Steve Henderson for a capable DH duo.  Or at least I’ve convinced myself that he is. 

The first baseball game I ever went to was the Yankees against these A’s. It may not been 1987 exactly, but it was this era and I went with my uncle and I remember that he was absolutely blown away by the size of Canseco. He wouldn’t stop talking about it, he just kept saying that his uniform looked painted on.  He really couldn’t get over it. My uncle’s reaction has stuck with me more than the actual size of the man.  In hindsight, it turns out my uncle had a great eye for things that are not as they should be. 

Alfredo Griffin is the short stop on this team and I recently read something that Bill James wrote about him.  He referenced that Griffin was the most aggressive baserunner he had ever seen.  Apparently he would try to take the extra base in just about any circumstances.  That’s good to know and I plan on keeping that in mind when playing with him.  His running rating is 1-14, which is good but not great.  So maybe he just seemed so aggressive because he was cutting it close?

Prediction: 3^rd place in the Rizzo division.  The other teams in this division have very solid pitching and should be able to contain the bats.  Don’t get me wrong, these yellow and green clad guys will have their moments and I wouldn’t be shocked if McGwire put up a monster year, but in the end I don’t think they can hang with the others.  I may be selling them short, but they recently got trounced by the Yankees in some preseason games I played and it left a bad taste in my mouth.