Goal accomplished.

I just realized its been like a month since I wrote in this but I had to put up some ranting I wrote just moments ago. I'm "friends" with the Oakland A's on Facebook and the latest news today is that Rosales is out with a stress fracture in his ankle. Out at least 4 weeks. Probably shut down for the season. Unless he can help the River Cats in any postseason efforts they have, whatevs. But I got into it with a few A's fans on the comments to that news who still think that its just "bad luck" that the A's have led the league in DL usage for the past 4 years. My comments to these other fans went like this:

Christopher Ady The A's have used the DL more times than any team in baseball the last 4 years (I believe--read it when Sheets went down). Huge red flag! We need a revamping of our training and medical staff ASAP!

2 hours ago · ·

Sean Thomas ‎@Christopher I honestly think its becuase these last 4 years we've had a group of 1-2 yr guys and players that are way over there hill.

• Christopher Ady

  Really Sean? Heres the most glaring examples in my mind of ongoing issues. Likely not all of them could be prevented by the best care and treatment possible, but I think many would have been.
  Duchsherer: cant stay healthy because they only ...did surgery on one of his hips when the problem was in both.
  Anderson: Pitches great, goes to DL, comes back too soon, goes back to DL.
  Braden: Lack of detection of injury or rash to his foot and he's out for hella long, then back and has no feeling in his toes. Pitches horribly in pain soon after his perfect game. Finally goes to DL.
  Crisp and Suzuki: experience intercostal strains within weeks of each other.
  Ellis: Resting pulled hammy, tries to come back to soon, on to the DL. Devine: It shouldnt take this long to rehab him. After Tommy John, tendinitis develops.
  Chavvy: no chiropractic work could have helped his neck/back? No expert could set up a successful plan to let his shoulder heal an rehab it correctly?
  Connor Jackson: Injured hammy 10 days after we get him.
  
  Your eyebrows arent raised by any of this? Full confidence in our medical and training staff? I didnt even mention Rosales until now--stress fracture to his ankle? Was there any pain or "stress" detected in his ankle that could have been dealt with before it FRACTURED? And you know this is just a fraction of the injuries the A's have dealt with for the past 4 years.See More

  about an hour ago · · 1 personLoading... ·
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  Arturo Donovan Gutierrez The medical staff can not prevent injuries from happening on the field.....we will be fine....and be better if Carter realize he is in the big leagues and starts hitting....otherwise its going to be another year at Sacramento.

  about an hour ago · ·
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  Christopher Ady

  I said medical and TRAINING. That means proper conditioning, proper stretching, monitoring the amount of weight lifting, reducing inflammation of sore joints with ice and cortisone or whatever, chiropractic adjustments, massages, etc., doin...g all these things any good trainer at this level should be on top of. These players are being paid millions! No one is ever to blame when the A's miss out out on these investments?? I'm not saying no injuries should happen, but what are the medical and training staffs doing on the clubs that use the DL the least? Why cant we have people like that?

So I just thought I would throw that ranting here. Nothing new to any of you, but I am surprised I find A's fans who disagree with me and just seem oblivious.

Overall though, despite shitty circumstances like this, the A's have done well. We have climbed back to .500, managed to stay a little above it and we were even ahead of the Angels the other day. May pass em up again too. Kinda cool, but meaningless in the big picture since the Rangers are as good as clinched. That Cliff Lee deal worked out just how they needed it to. Even fantasy baseball has confirmed he's been the most valuable pitcher in the last 30 days. They are as good as clinched. So yeah, a winning season, maybe finish ahead of the Angels, 5 games over .500 and no more injuries would be nice. I'll take that into next year with a smile.

They were talkin in the A's radio pregame show the other day about how amazingly lucky (see: not lucky, Billy Beane's genius at work) to have so many young AND outstanding arms in our starting rotation. Most teams would kill to have the likes of Cahill, Anderson, Gio, Braden, Mazzaro, and even Outman fighting for a spot in the rotation next spring. They're all studs with wicked stuff. If Carter comes around with consistent power like we hope, perhaps Taylor as well, we could have a shot next year. If the A's acquire one nice bat in the offseason (someone like Adrian Gonzalez, Jose Bautista, Joey Votto, Paul Konerko, Carlos Gonzalez, Adrian Beltre, Adam Dunn, or Andre Ethier) I think we could be in contention for playoffs next year.

I'm goin to the game a week from today, Friday night game against the Rays. You know I love watchin the Rays and hey, last time I saw them, Braden tossed a perfect game. :)

Thanks for reading.