Has Billy Beane lost his touch?

[Lex Luthor]

One year ago the Oakland A's had the best record in baseball at 59-36. Then on July 31st the A's traded Yoenis Cespedes for John Lester. The A's record before the trade 66-41. The A's record after the trade was 22-33.

In the offseason Billy Beane traded Josh Donaldson to the Toronto Blue Jays for third baseman Brett Lawrie, right-hander Kendall Graveman, left-hander Sean Nolin and minor league shortstop Franklin Barreto. Donaldson and Cespedes were the two best players on the A's roster. Now they're both gone and the team went from first to worst. Josh Donaldson is having an MVP season. Cespedes barely missed making the All Star team and is having a solid season. The A's have the worst record in the American League at 41-50.

It looks to me like Billy Beane has destroyed this team. Has Billy Beane totally ****ed up, or do Lawrie, Graveman, Nolin and Barreto have so much potential that the Donaldson trade could eventually work out in favor of the A's?

[Hootie]

Originally Posted by 'Hamas' Jenkins

Defensive ratings require three years for an adequate sample size.

One year Gerrardo Parra was apparently the greatest CF'er ever ... then he just ... fell off the map. I watched him against KC and he took the worst routes to about 5 balls I've ever seen ... and of course made 1 remarkable catch, only off the worst route ever

[Prison Bitch]

Originally Posted by duncan_idaho

I get the positional adjustments and such.

What I don't get is what is going on with the infield metrics. How Eric Hosmer can be viewed as the 13th-best guy at 1B by Fangraphs just doesn't make sense to me.

I can buy a few guys (Adrian Gonzalez, for example) being ranked above Hosmer, and I know it's too early for the 2015 sample to produce a reliable defensive projection... but this is something that has been consistent throughout his career.

And it still doesn't track for me.

FG had an article on Hos a while back (or maybe it was Royals Review using their data, can't recall). The theory was he stands way too close to the bag and doesn't leave it quickly and so he has bad positioning when grounders sneak just past him - brining down his range factor.

[NWTF]

Originally Posted by Tombstone RJ

My understanding is that the A's are the poorest team in the majors and really can't afford to pay big contracts so Beane basically unloads the guys who are gonna get big contracts and reloads with young/developing talent.

So, is this the case with these two whom Beane traded, I don't know. But that has pretty much been the story of the A's for the last 30 years.

Basically this^^^

If they cant rebound and are stuck at the bottom I guess the case can be made Beane has lost his touch, but for as long as I can remember the A's have been one the lowest payroll teams and yet remained competitive.

I guess if youve always despised Beane nows your chance to unload, but really I doubt anyone could have done as well for as long as they did with the cash restraints they have.