The good: Kouzmanoff is all about improvement and the work needed to make that improvement:

"I read an article that said how poor my defense was," he said. "I sort of took that to heart. My footwork wasn't good, and I had stiff hands."

His solution to both problems? "Reps."

On the flip side, Kouzmanoff appears to have a weak grasp of the who/whom distinction:

"I just started working on it, and I kept at it until I got better," he said. "I don't remember the guy's name, but a shout out to whomever wrote that."

The fact that I'm a long-distance fan should make it easier for me to follow the team when they move, right? If they're in Portland or San Jose or Las Vegas, they'll still be the same team as far as I'm concerned, yes?

No. I think what Leitch is getting at is right. I mean, look at Jonah Keri (as Leitch does), the world's most famous Expos fan. He doesn't live in Montreal, but he's no follower of the Washington Nationals. If the team moves far enough away, they very likely will lose their identity and it may become very hard to be a fan.

I have no idea what I'll do then. Will I become teamless? Will I overcome the new identity and love the new A's, not for who they were, but for who they are and will be? Will I watch curling instead?

It's not a small part of me, by the way, that says "forty miles south to San Jose won't change who this team is" and thus fervently hopes that, if they really do have to move, they'll just move to San Jose. But I'm probably fooling myself. San Jose isn't Oakland. It's not even close. It's a different kind of city with a different kind of people. It will be a different kind of ballpark and an entirely different fanbase. Fremont at least sort of split the difference between San Jose and Oakland, but San Jose itself? It's wishful thinking. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1036.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1036 Susan Slusser just tweeted an update on Jake Fox's option status: he's out them. Eric Patterson is also out. I started thinking about the A's roster and I wonder if either of these guys is going to survive spring training with Oakland.

Assume twelve pitchers, because that's been the status quo for a few years now. So that leaves thirteen position players. The absolute mortal locks are Kurt Suzuki, Landon Powell, Mark Ellis, Aaron Pennington, Jack Cust, Rajai Davis, Coco Crisp, Ryan Sweeney, and Gabe Gross. That's nine. Daric Barton seems to be the assumed first baseman, so that's ten. If Eric Chavez is healthy, he'll be on the roster: eleven. The A's didn't trade for Kevin Kouzmanoff to sit in Sacramento: twelve. That leaves one more spot, and about five guys who might take it: Adam Rosales, Steve Tolleson, Jake Fox, Travis Buck, or Eric Patterson. In the above configuration, no matter how many reps Eric Chavez takes at shortstop this spring, the A's don't really have a utility infielder, so you have to figure Rosales takes that 13th spot. That leaves Fox and Patterson, both out of options, in a position to be traded to a team that has room for them.

There's some wiggle-room here, though. First, is Chavez healthy? Will he be ready Opening Day? Or is he a candidate for a Day 1 DL move?

Second, the A's have often left their fifth starter in Sacramento to start the year because of the copious early-season off-days MLB schedules.

Put these two things together and maybe Jake Fox and Eric Patterson can both earn bench spots, at least for a few weeks. When the fifth starter needs to come up, decisions need to be made, but at that point, who knows what kind of injuries Cust or Barton or Kouzmanoff might have suffered.

The other possibility is, assuming health for Chavez, the A's really believe in his abilities at shortstop, so they decide to not carry Rosales, figuring that in an injury situation at short, Chavez can step in, and if Ellis goes down, Pennington can move over (he started fifteen games at second for the A's in 2008). Thus, without the need to carry Rosales, Fox could be Chavez's bench-bat twin, a four-corners right-hander.

I wouldn't count on that last possibility, though. Much as the A's have a reputation for front-office creativity and bargain-hunting, their roster construction hasn't been the most adventurous thing around. They've never really resisted the move to seven relievers, for instance, even though they've had some very good bullpens with weak #7 men. They also don't really seem to have bought into that Earl Weaver maxim: "Your backup shortstop is in AAA." This, of course, is the issue in play here.

Not that Jake Fox or Eric Patterson is likely to turn into someone the A's truly regret losing, but both can have their uses (even if Patterson's are almost wholly speculative at this point), so it'd certainly be said to see them squeezed out by Eric Chavez's last gasp at relevance (along with the A's continued reluctance to trust that six men is enough to cover three to four innings of pitching on any given night). jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1035.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1035 In the category of "Man, Medicine is Really Weird" comes the story that Justin Duchscherer is going to have the "minor procedure" wherein "radio waves are used to heat and burn the nerve endings". Really? Ack. Source: blog post on The Drumbeat by Susan Slusser. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1034.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1034 Our beat writers cite PECOTA projections.

That said, Slusser doesn't cite where those projections come from, which is a little weird, to the point where I think it's probably just an oversight. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1033.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1033 Gabe Gross has apparently signed a cheap one-year deal with the A's. So that means the A's traded two outfielders to the Padres to alleviate an outfield crunch partially created by their weird redundant signing of Coco Crisp, and they follow that up by ... making a weird redundant signing of Gabe Gross. Yeah. I can talk myself into this, though.

After all, it's not like Gabe Gross is a bad player. He's got a career EqA of .255, with the last two years (671 total PAs) clocking in at .262 and .239. He's not a good hitter, in other words, but he's not a total horror-show with the bat, either. He has excellent fielding numbers per Total Zone, putting up a +21 per 1250 innings in rightt field, although he's only logged 1877 innings there overall, so it's not as big a sample as you'd like to see. UZR agrees with the assessment, though, putting him at +17.6 per 150 games. So I think we can call him a plus right-fielder, which presumably makes him a plus left-fielder as well (unless for whatever reason he just can't read the ball off the bat from that side, which is highly implausible) and could probably handle center in a pinch, although the A's have plenty of center fielders already on the roster.

Gross has been heavily platooned in his career: he's got 1260 plate appearances against righties and just 177 against lefties. That's kind of remarkable, actually, given that you tend to face relievers, get the odd start against a lefty when your platoon partner is ailing, etc. etc. It appears to be for good reason, though, since he's a .152/.273/.291 hitter against lefties in that small sample.

Anyway, if Gross were being brought in as the lefty half of a platoon, that'd be fine, except that Ryan Sweeney's already a lefty, Coco Crisp is a switch-hitter (and not one of those faux-switch-hitters, either, but a guy who's hit about the same against both halves in his career), and Rajai Davis's platoon split is basically nonexistent (although he hasn't had that many major-league plate appearances, so it's possible he's a latent platoon player that just hasn't come out of hiding yet).

As mentioned above, the A's already have a three-center-fielder outfield, so Gross obviously isn't being brought in for late-game defensive purposes. And to the extent that Gross is here to replace Travis Buck as a lefty pinch-hitter, he isn't really an upgrade. CHONE and Marcel project both guys to basically be league-average hitters, but given that Buck has hit well in the past, both in the majors and minors, and that Buck is four years younger than Gross, I'll bet that PECOTA is going to spit out much better 75th and 90th percentile projections for Buck than for Gross.

I can't really complain, I guess, because a depth signing is a depth signing, and the A's very clearly do not believe in Travis Buck's ability to bust through as a star. Plus, unless I'm mistaken, Buck has an option remaining (having been sent on the Sacramento-Oakland shuttle in 2008 and 2009, but having spent his only minor league time in 2007 on a rehab stint), so he can spent the late spring in Sacramento and wait for one of the four guys ahead of him to get hurt. And hope that Michael Taylor doesn't bash the hell out of the ball, leading the A's to hand him the first available opportunity instead of Buck. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1032.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1032 Buster Olney reported on Twitter that the A's are looking at Johnny Damon if they can't sign Ben Sheets. The snarky response is "what, is Damon learning a sinker?" But put that aside. With Jack Cust and Jake Fox already in the fold, Damon is presumably not being looked at for DH at-bats (or at least not more than occasional ones).

Damon's been a good hitter the last few years, putting up offensive numbers about 30% above the league average. He is 36, though, so you can't expect that to keep up forever. CHONE has him putting up 11.5 batting runs in 137 games. That seems fair. On the defensive side, this isn't the same Damon who patroled center field so effectively (a +14 rate per Total Zone) in 2001. His UZR/150 in LF over the last three years comes out to 2.9 runs above average, with his good range making up for his terrible arm, but the trend line isn't good: 37.4 in 271 innings in 2007; 11.6 in 659 innings in 2008; and -12.1 in 1117 innings last year. Still, Damon hasn't really amassed enough playing time in left to get a great read on what he's going to do next year, so let's just call it +5. Damon's non-stealing baserunning numbers (his base-stealing exploits are built into batting runs) are pretty solid, in the range of +1.5 a year the past three years, so if you throw that in, you're looking at a +18 player over the course of a season in left.

Coco Crisp, given his injury troubles, is only projected by CHONE to play 110 games, in which he'll put up a -3.5 batting line. I think that's reasonable, because if he plays more games than that, it's probably because he's healthy enough to hit better on a per-PA level, so let's call it -3.5 even for the full season. Crisp has been an absurdly good left fielder, to the tune of a career +23.5 UZR/150, but the last time he played in left was 2005. In center, he's been slightly above average when you aggregate the last three years. Let's say he'd be +10 in left. Crisp has added real value on the bases his last three years: +6 in 2007, +1 in 2008, and +1.5 in his abbreviated 2009. I'll give him +2 for 2010. So all told, I think we can call Crisp +8.5 in left.

Rajai Davis is problematic because of his age, his 2009 flukiness, and the question of what his performance would look like if he got to play every day, day in and day out, instead of the bounce-around role he's had for the last year and a half. Rajai is not a good hitter, despite his +10.4 last year. CHONE's projection of -3 (i.e. Coco Crisp Redux) looks right to me. CHONE is wierdly pessimistic about his defense, though. For his career (1723 innings), Rajai is +12 UZR/150 in center. CHONE regresses that all the way down to a -1 in 2010. I'd give Rajai a +8 in center, although I could be accused of optimism on that point. Rajai also added 5.5 runs on the bases last year, although being used as a pinch-runner might have had something to do with that. If he has to earn his own way on base, he won't get as many opportunities as he has in the past. So let's call him +3 over the course of the season. That adds up to a +8 center fielder.

Crisp and Davis basically having the same pre-position-adjustment value, and Damon's left-field value being ten runs more than Davis's in center, is a nice set of coincidences, since the LF->CF adjustment is said to be about ten runs. If you take these numbers as gospel, or at least as close enough for government work, then regardless of whether Crisp or Davis is in center or left, the upgrade from Crisp to Damon is on the order of one win, but a move from Davis to Damon is basically a wash. It's impossible to say how much money Damon would be getting in a potential deal with the A's, but any more than a handful of millions would probably be a waste.

Also, in case you're wondering, as much as Jack Cust struggled in 2009, his CHONE hitting projection is in the range of +20, about double Damon's, so signing Damon with the intention of making Cust a bench hitter seems counterproductive. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1031.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1031 Susan Slusser has reported on Twitter (or at least that's where I saw it) that the A's and Padres have agreed on a trade sending Scott Hairston back to San Diego along with Aaron Cunningham for Kevin Kouzmanoff and "a prospect". Obviously, the deal can't be fully evaluated without knowing who the prospect is. It's one thing if it's Jaff Decker or Donovan Tate. It's another if it's Allan Dykstra. (I'd assume it's actually someone in between, someone on the level of Cunningham, but that's mainly because I see the trade almost as two separate trades, and that may not be an accurate depiction of the mindset of Hoyer and Beane.)

On the major-league level, this leaves the A's attempting to solve their third-base problem (and acknowledging that Eric Chavez is done) while alleviating their outfield crunch. This presumably leaves Ryan Sweeney without any serious competition as the everyday starter in right and Coco Crisp and Rajai Davis in some configuration in left and center. It won't hit much, but that outfield could rival Seattle's defensively, right? (Although let's be fair to the three guys -- they're all basically league-average hitters. Sweeney and Crisp have shown that the last two years, and Davis ... well, Davis was about as much below average in 2008 as he was above in 2009. Marcel and CHONE both have him somewhere in the range of average offensively, with Marcel being much more optimistic.)

With Hairston and Cunningham out of the way (which I don't mean as a negative on either guy, since both have shown that they can hit), that presumably clears the way for Travis Buck (who's supposedly been hitting with Nick Swisher this winter) to be the fourth outfielder. I think this is a good thing as long as he gets some at-bats, because I still believe in his stick.

What about Kouzmanoff? He turns 29 at the end of July, which I believe makes him 28 in terms of the standard seasonal-age cutoff, but whatever, he's basically in the tail end of his prime. Kouzmanoff's an arbitration-eligible guy, but he's in his first year of such status, so he's under team control until 2012. In WAR terms, he's been very steady: over the last three years, he's been at 27.6, 27.6, and 27.1 RAR, though the shape of that value has changed. In 2007, he was 10 runs above average with the bat but a little below average afield. By 2009, he was hitting below average while putting up 7.5 runs above average per UZR. CHONE figures him to take another step backward with the bat in 2010, although a small one. Combine that with his UZR/150 over three years of data (which is apparently the consensus of what it takes to get an idea of a guy's true defensive ability) and you've got a two-win player.

That's not exactly something you get excited about having, but it is something that's not readily available in the free-agent market. Adrian Beltre's a superior player, but CHONE figures him for 2.7 WAR, just a half-win upgrade on Kouzmanoff, and he signed for ten million. So to get a guy you're going to pay a few million dollars for this production, you have to give up some stuff.

What I'm curious about is what happens if Eric Chavez does make a miraculous comeback. That's not something you can really plan on, so I can't really advocate not getting an actually adequate third baseman (rather than notionally adequate guys like Eric Patterson, Jake Fox, or Dallas McPherson), even if it does cost you Cunningham. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1030.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1030 Today marks the first day that I'm abandoning ESPN's (basic) box scores and going with HoopData's advanced box scores instead. I know about some of the advanced stats the the real NBA geeks are using, and I know the kind of emphasis they've been placing on things like effective field goal percentage (or true shooting percentage) rather than vanilla (or naive, I guess you could call it) shooting percentage, on usage rate, on pace. To this point, I've essentially been estimating these things, trying to point out when a guy's points came only by using way too many offensive possessions, or when someone was ridiculously efficient or utterly greedy on the boards. But it's all been rough mental math, attempting to estimate possession counts in my head from a sense of field goal attempts + turnovers. Now, with the advanced box scores, that data will actually be presented to me.

Wolves 104, Celtics 122: For instance, in this entirely expected 18-point win by the Celtics at home over the hapless Wolves, I can tell you that the pace was quite high, with 101 possessions for each team, but also that Boston wasn't up to its usual standards of defensive efficiency, with a 103.0 defensive rating. That number is a simple one: it's just points per hundred possessions. (The definition of a possession ought to be mentioned: it's basically what you'd think it is, but an offensive rebound does not create a new possession -- it instead extends the current possession. As far as I can tell, this is basically so that both teams have the same number of possessions at the end of the game. (I don't see why there aren't sometimes one-off errors because of one team taking the final shot, but maybe we just round that out because the effect on the overall numbers isn't worth the pain of teams not having the same denominator in the rate stats.)) Here's some context: the current league pace average is 93, ranging from 101.2 (the Warriors) to 87.7 (the Blazers), so this 101-possession game was quite fast indeed. The league average offensive and defensive ratings (which are the same for reasons that I hope are clear) are 106.6. Offense goes from 114.3 (Phoenix -- it's not all pace with them) to 96.3 (New Jersey, natch). Defense ranges from 98.7 (Lakers, the only team under 100, and this shouldn't be any surprise to anyone who's watching so far this year) to 115.1 (Toronto, natch redux).

What else? There's turnover rate, which is the percentage of possessions that end in turnovers. The league average there is 13.8%. On offense, that goes from 11.2% (Atlanta) to 16.2% (Charlotte), so there's not actually a ton of spread there. The same lack of spread is found on defense: 16.1% (the Warriors, surprisingly) to 11.6% (Toronto again). There are the percentage numbers for rebounding. The offensive average is 26.9%, which is higher than you might think. (The defensive average is of course 73.1%, then.) On offense, the range runs from 20.3% (Warriors again, no surprise given their size) to 33.4% (Memphis, they of Marc Gasol). On defense, you've got 78.4% at the top (Orlando, Dwight Howard) and 69% at the bottom (Warriors one more time).

Then there's some shooting stats, like free throws per field goal. The league-average there is about 0.23. On offense, the Nuggets get to the line a lot (.33) and the Bucks never get there at all (.162). On defense, the Hornets don't foul (.186) and the Bucks (again) do (.294). Finally, there's adjusted shooting percentage, which is represented by two stats, Effective Field Goal Percentage (eFG%) and True Shooting Percentage (TS%). The point of both stats is to adjust for the fact that threes are worth more (so a lower percentage on them is acceptable -- the easiest example being the extremes, that 33% on threes is the same as 50% on twos, as a matter of the probability of scoring working out to averaging a point per shot). The difference between the two stats is that TS% takes into account free throws, while eFG% does not. I can't easily find a ranking of TS%, but in terms of eFG%, the average is 49.6% and the leaders track the efficiency ratings, from 55.1% at the top (Phoenix) to 43.7% at the bottom (Nets) on offense, and 45.4% at the top on defense (L.A. Lakers) to 52.9% at the bottom (Warriors). (It's not a tautology that eFG% would track the Offensive Rating and Defensive Rating numbers, though, because turnovers could factor in -- a team might harass another team into a lot of turnovers but not be very good at keeping them from missing shots, or vice versa. If you look at the actual rankings, the numbers track fairly well, although taking the TOV% leaders shows some discrepancies. For instance, the Warriors are last in eFG% allowed, but their league-best turnover rate allows them to be 25th in Defensive Rating.

A lot of what's in the advanced box scores, rather than providing context, as described above, instead just adds more information. For instance, I can tell you that Ryan Hollins drew two charges in the game, and that Kendrick Perkins had hsi shot blocked three times. I can tell you that there were a total of three and-ones in the game. I can tell you that Kendrick Perkins shot 7-10 at the rim and took no shots from farther away than "at rim". I can tell you that of Rajon Rondo's 15 assists, seven led to buckets at the rim, and five led to threes.

There are some stats that require some estimation (although I've read that, with a few exceptions, these estimations are remarkably close to what we'd get if we did a play-by-play analysis of each player): usage, assist rate, turnover rate, rebounding rates, points contributed, and possessions used. Usage is a percentage stat estimating the percentage of his team's possessions he used (by "used", we mean "had the ball last" -- either you took a shot, got fouled, or turned it over). Possessions used is a counting stat which incorporates 1/3 of the player's assists and subtracts out 1/3 of the player's assisted field goals made. (The idea of this is presumably that on about 1/3 of assisted field goals, it was really the work of the assister that should be credited with the possession, not the assistee. If Chris Paul works his man, drives to the bucket, and dishes to Peja on the wing for a catch-and-shoot three, who really used that possession? After all, if after all that work, Chris Paul lost the ball, he'd have used the possession in the stat sheets. Now, if Chris Paul does all the work and Peja misses the shot, then that's all on Peja: the possession is his entirely. This, on the one hand, is probably fair, and on the same hand, likely represents the limitation that we don't have a box score stat for "would've been an assist if the shot had been made".

I think that just about covers it! I'll try not to write any more than I usually do, because I could spend all day in these stats, but if I do that, I run the risk of losing my two readers. So I'll keep it reasonable, but hopefully more informative than ever.

So back to Minnesota's loss to Boston. I've already mentioned that the game was played very fast, so Boston's unusually high points-allowed total is more due to ten extra possessions in the game than it is to overall bad defense (103 rating versus 100 on the season). Neither team did a great job on the defensive glass, as both teams were above-average on the other end, especially Minnesota, with a 31.4% offensive rebound rate. Kevin Love, in particular, ate up 17% of the offensive rebounds available, for a total of five. The Celtics were carried by Paul Pierce, whose 29 points came on just 18 possessions. The Celtics were a ball-movement machine in the game (or the scorer was particularly generous, either way), as Rajon Rondo's 15 dimes were symptomatic of 34 on 42 field goals overall. All eight of Ray Allen's field goals were assisted, in fact.

Cavs 95, Mavs 102: That's a very solid home win for the Mavs. The big number that jumps out is just six turnovers, a rate of 6.7%, a number that's nearly half the league-best 11.2% rate of the Hawks. The Cavs got to the line (.338 free throws per field goal), but the Mavs made the shots (19-20), with Tim Thomas putting up the only miss, hitting 6-7. And the Mavs did all this without Dirk Nowitzki, who was still out with teeth in his elbow. Just wanted to continue to the gross-out for one more post. The Mavs did a nice job on LeBron, who got to the line only seven times on twenty-three shots, and who made just four of his eight shots at the rim. LeBron's shot selection also comes into play, as he hit 2-7 from the long-two distance (16-23 feet). Long twos are, of course, the worst shot in the game overall: you're far enough away from the basket that your percentage is low, but you're not so far that you get an extra point for making the shot. LeBron isn't the kind of shooter whose stroke is so pure that he can hit those shots with great consistency. Shaq was a monster on the boards with a 26% rebound rate, but he only played 18 minutes, perhaps in part due to fouls (he had three), perhaps in part due to ball-hogginess (32% usage, second only to LeBron, but finishing with just 4.3 points contributed on 10.4 possessions), perhaps just because he's old, or perhaps because Mike Brown is, after all, still Mike Brown.

Lakers 93, Pistons 81: Granted that they didn't play any Eastern big boys, that whole thing about how the Lakers were benefiting from a bunch of home games, etc.? That's a 4-1 road trip. The Lakers won this one with defense, as the pace was actually fairly high (97 possessions). Detroit managed just an 83.5 Offensive Rating, though (not that the Lakers' 95.9 was anything to write home about). The Pistons' excuse is that they're missing most of their good players. Thus, they have Rodney Stuckey, who actually got to the rim (eight shots there), but couldn't finish (four made), and took the rest of his shots from distance (2-5 on long twos). He also had just one assist in fifteen possessions, a pretty low rate for a supposed point guard. The Lakers' offensive excuse probably revolves around Kobe's broken finger, but that finger doesn't affect shot selection (3-6 from long two, 1-4 from three). L.A. did force turnovers, as Detroit handed over the ball 22 times, including 15 Laker steals, led by six from Ron Artest (Kobe added five, presumably with his left hand). Artest had nine assists, five of them leading to buckets at the rim and three leading to threes, so he had an excellent night. Andrew Bynum added 14 points contributed (PC from here on out, blogwide) on just nine possessions. (By some math I don't understand, Hoopdata claims that works out to 1.50 PC/PU.)

Adam Morrison, by the way? Still really trying to impress the brass. In his nine minutes of (by definition) garbage time, he used 38% of the team's possessions. Sadly, all that work ended in just one field goal and one assist.

Blazers 102, Heat 95: Both of these teams are in the bottom four in Pace, so they egged each other on in this one, resulting in just 85 possessions, below even Portland's league-slowest 87.7. Obviously if you score over 100 while playing that slow, you're playing pretty good offense. Brandon Roy led the team with 28 and eight assists, for an excellent 30 PC in just 18 possessions. LaMarcus Aldridge, by contrast, scored 23, had just one assist, and had half of his buckets assisted, so he managed just 20 PC on a team-high 24 possessions. Dwyane Wade used an astounding 36 of his team's possesions (remember, there were only 85 in the game), but his efficiency was merely ok, with 28 points and ten assists, as he missed eighteen shots and turned it over three times. Quentin Richardson, though, had a game you don't need an advanced box score to appreciate: 7-7 from the floor, 7-7 from three. Add in his assist and he actually averaged slightly more than three points contributed per possession. Which kind of makes sense in this case since every time he touched the ball he made a three. (James Jones had a fun efficiency rating, too, as he hit his one shot, a three, in nine minutes played. The only thing dragging him down is that the shot was assisted. It's a good thing he hit that three, though, because he was that close to putting up a nine-trillion.)

Bobcats 94, Knicks 98: And look at the Knicks! Yes, they're 10-17. Yes, they're 11th in the Eastern Conference. But they're only a game back of the Pistons! They're right in this thing! Charlotte plays bad offense and good defense. The Knicks play average offense and mediocre defense. What did this clash of styles add up to? A defensive battle, as neither team got over the average Offensive Rating for the game. The Knicks made it work by getting to the line, putting up an excellent .423 free throw rate, led by, of all people, Big Cock, who took ten free throws on 14 shots. Somehow, he ended up with zero rebounds, though. How does a guy his size do that? Also, from his shot chart, it seems like Cock was getting fouled in bad (for the 'cats) situations, since he only has one field goal on the books at the rim and just one more from less than ten feet. By contrast, he took seven threes. Maybe he was just the designated foulee down the stretch? Eh, doesn't matter that much. David Lee's line pops, though: 15/15/7. He struggled with the shot, but grabbed 38% of the defensive boards. Matching him on the other end was Tyson Chandler, who apparently responded to Gerald Wallace calling him out by grabbing 38% of his own, for a total of 14. Or maybe it was just because Gerald Wallace didn't play in the game. After all, Boris Diaw didn't respond (four boards, 10% overall rate), but Ray Felton did (nine boards, although that's more playing time than anything, since his rate was 13.5% (which is still nothing to sneeze at for a guy his size)). Good sign for the Knicks' defense? Four drawn charges in the game.

Hornets 92, Raptors 98: Hey, whoa, a Toronto game where the other team didn't blow them off the defensive end of the floor. New Orleans managed just a 95 Rating on offense, "led" by their three stars: Chris Paul shot 3-13, missing eight shots from the mid- and long-range, and turned it over five times (though he did have seven assists); Peja shot 4-15, including 1-7 from three; and David West hit only nine of twenty-one, although he did get on the defensive glass (25%). Chris Bosh had 25/11, but six turnovers, and Andrea Bargnani missed threes all over the place (1-6), so the offensive stalwart was Jarret Jack, who had 15/5/7 and no turnovers. He was the only Raptor to contribute more than one point per possession. Remember, Toronto won this game.

Nuggets 96, Grizzlies 102: Z-Bo just destroyed this game, scoring 32 on 21 shots, hitting a three, grabbing twenty-four rebounds, and even dishing three assists. He did all this while committing just two turnovers. So that's a 1.27 PC/poss., a 21% offensive rebound rate (context: the league leader is Ben Wallace with 16%), 36% on defense, all with a turnover rate of just 7%. The Nuggets just didn't get on the glass, as Z-Bo's 21% offensive mark topped all but one Nugget's defensive rebound mark (that one being Birdman, of course, who did great work on the boards in his 22 minutes: 28.5% offensive, 36% defensive). It wasn't just Z-Bo for the Grizz, as Sam Young pulled down 29% on offense as well, although his 2-5 shooting at the rim tells me he might have gotten some missed tip shots into the stat books. Denver was led by Carmelo's 41 on solid shooting (13-26), but he shot just 1-6 from three and turned it over five times. He did get to the line 17 times, though, and sixteen of his shots were of the at-rim variety. Taking 22 of 26 shots at the rim or from three is generally an excellent recipe for success, but the threes just didn't fall for Carmelo this time.

Ok?

So that was a really long post. I may struggle to keep these things reasonable. But like I said, I'll do what I can. Right now, I'm just sort of reveling in the incredible amount of information and the picture you can gather. You know, being able to criticize LeBron's shot selection with actual data, to point out why Carmelo is maybe the deadliest scorer in the game, to show just how impressive Z-Bo's 24-rebound game is compared to Birdman's 14-board outing, and on and on and on ... it's a dream come true. I'll get better about condensing it down to just a few tidbits. Or else I'll keep writing Basketbawful-length posts and you'll (all two of you) just have to deal.

Also, if you see anything obviously wrong or confusing with my explanation of the stats I'm using, let me know. You know where to find me. I'll update this post as needed, and try to be clear in the future about what I'm talking about. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1029.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1029 ESPN says that Coco Crisp is on the verge of coming to the A's. Where does that leave Oakland's outfield?

In my last post on the A's lineup / roster, I figured the A's outfield looked like, from left to right, Taylor-Sweeney-Hairston. (Or flip Hairston and Taylor if Taylor's a good defender.) Ken Arneson noted on Twitter that he'd prefer to have Taylor play in Sacramento for a while, then have him push either Rajai Davis or Scott Hairston out of the starting lineup. In retrospect, this seems to better match Oakland's M.O., so let's assume that the outfield as of now is Hairston-Davis-Sweeney, with the main reserve being either Travis Buck or Aaron Cunningham.

With 12 pitchers and nine starting players along with a backup catcher, that left three bench spots. One of those will be a backup infielder, ideally Gregorio Petit, but perhaps Aaron Miles. One of those will be a backup outfielder. That leaves the 25th spot up for grabs. Does Oakland, especially with a defense-oriented outfield in Sweeney and Davis, have another potential bat in Buck/Cunningham? Do they carry both Miles and Petit? Tommy Everidge? Dallas McPherson?

I don't think the addition of Coco Crisp changes that question so much as magnifies it. Now, instead of a hitting fourth outfielder, the A's will have a defense-and-running one in Crisp, since he isn't much of a hitter (.336/.378 last year). He's not a total black hole as long as you hit him low in the order, and he's a legit (albeit weak-armed) outfielder, especially in left (although he'll give you good work in center as well). He also steals bases at a good clip, although he's never done it at the volume that Rajai Davis has shown. In short, he's got a Rajai Davis bat with slightly sub-Rajai legs and defense, and he'll be playing Rajai's rightful position: left bench.

This does presumably signal that the A's really are going to be sending Michael Taylor to AAA to start the year. If you figure Taylor's going to make the major league squad, then your fourth outfielder (Davis) is already on the team.

But getting back to that 25th man, I have to assume the A's are planning on having a (potential) bat make the roster as the 25th man. If your bench is Crisp, Petit, and Miles, you've got three guys who can pinch-run for Daric Barton and Jake Fox, but no one who can pinch-hit for anyone.

On the other hand, who are we pinch-hitting for? If that last spot is one of the three aforementioned guys, are any of them better hitters than any starter? I guess there's Cliff Pennington, but Pennington's still a guy who put up a .342/.418 line in limited action last year, so it's not that clear-cut. (Translated into wOBA, that's in the Erick Aybar / Elvis Andrus range among shortstops, i.e. not great, but fine.)

Having addressed the question of what to do now that Crisp (who I'm going to be typoing as "Crips" all year long) is on the roster, he other question about is whether paying him $5M is better than paying Jack Cust a similar amount of money (and likely a little less) in the first place. The simple answer is that Crisp put up 1.2 WAR last year in just 49 games with the Royals, while Cust managed just 1.0 in the full season. That's, of course, not all there is to it. First, Cust is one of the few players the A's have had over the last few years who's been able to play every single day. That has value in, if nothing else, the cost of roster machinations -- when guys get hurt, you end up having to add other people to the roster, which ends up sometimes meaning losing players on waivers, and either way, major league pay rates are higher than minor league ones. There's also the fact that Crisp is, hopefully by June, going to be utterly redundant as Rajai Davis, Ryan Sweeney, or Scott Hairston gets pushed to the bench to make room for Michael Taylor.

On the other hand, Crisp probably makes better injury protection for the outfield than Jack Cust. If Davis, Sweeney or Hairston goes down and the A's don't want to bring Taylor up yet, Crisp brings enough to the table to not kill the A's in the absence of that starter. But if that's the rationale, then the A's must really not believe in Travis Buck and Aaron Cunningham anymore, which is a shame. Buck, after all, hit well in the majors in 2007 and in the minors in 2008 while playing very good right-field defense (at least per UZR -- he's pretty awkward out there to the eye). Cunningham, meanwhile, will still be just 24 this year, and he's hit at every minor-league stop. His major-league .271/.338 line has been compiled in a grand total of 144 plate appearances over two seasons, so it's far too early to give up on him. Who knows what the story with his defense is, but he's got 300 innings of corner outfield experience in the majors that UZR pegs as perfectly average.

But look, let's not forget: in the end, this is a guy named Coco Crisp. There has to be some value in that, right? jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1028.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1028 I have been what I call "hella cleaning". I will take some time out for you, though, dear reader, because I know you hunger for my mostly groundless NBA opinions.

Blazers 83, Magic 92: The Magic became the latest team to get to 20 wins, taking advantage of a Blazers team that just added a guy named Jeff Pendergraph (yes, Jeff Pendergraph -- the immortal!) to their active roster. (He didn't play, sadly.) Orlando didn't have anyone score over 15, but they had eight guys with 7+. Dwight Howard grabbed 20 boards, although he had a ton of defensive opportunities with Portland shooting only 37%. Brandon Roy had 33 to lead Portland. Oh, one other bad number for the Blazers: seven assists on 29 field goals, and no player had more than one.

Jazz 110, Bobcats 102: The Jazz had three players with 20+, including CJ Miles off the bench, and three others in double digits, led by Paul Millsap's 18. Deron and Boozer had their usual double-doubles. Miles got his time at the expense of Wesley Matthews, who started by played just seven minutes, although the recap contains no mention of an injury. Gerald Wallace had an enormous game for the losers with 30/13/5/2/1. He apparently called out Boris Diaw and Tyson Chandler after the game for not really doing the work big men are supposed to do, as they ended up with eight rebounds in 61 combined minutes. If I'm Larry Brown, I don't mind that too much from Diaw because that's just not who he is, and I've got Wallace doing great boardwork from the other forward spot. But my center has to have more rebounds.

Clippers 112, Sixers 107: This one went to overtime as the Clippers tied the game wit 0:11 left on an Al Thornton layup off an Eric Gordon assist. The Sixers apparently could not get a shot off in the remaining 0:11. Chris Kaman led the Clips in scoring with 24 and added eleven boards, Marcus Camby had 22 rebounds, including 19 on the defensive glass, and Baron Davis had 20 points and 13 dimes. Iguodala played 50 minutes for the Sixers and wound up with 20/9/7 and four steals. Marreese Speights (one of the best names in the NBA, currently, although the Sixers have a lot of competition for that crown just on their own roster, including Iguodala, Thaddeus Young, Sam Dalembert, Jrue Holiday, Elton Brand, Royal Ivey, and Rodney Carney. Even Jason Kapono's name is kind of cool. Quite a collection, right?) led the team in scoring with 28 off the bench. Dalembert was sidelined most of the game (11 minutes of run) as he wound up with five fouls.

Hawks 98, Bulls 101: This was also an overtime game, as neither team was able to score in the final 0:35 after Derrick Rose's game-tying layup. Rose had 32 for the game to go with six assists and zero turnovers. Luol Deng added 21/12/6 as a solid second banana. Atlanta was led by Joe Johnson's 40 and Al Horford contributed 15/12.

Lakers 103, Nets 84: The (arguably) best team in the league against the (not even arguably) worst? A 19-point win for the visiting team is about what you'd expect. Andrew Bynum had a disappointing game, fouling out in just eleven minutes, but he was pretty much the only one. Pau had 14/14/6, Lamar Odom had 14/12/4, Kobe had a rare double-digit rebounding game and ended up with 29/10/5, and Jordan Farmar was the night's bench contributor (not counting Odom, who's more like a sixth starter) with 7-9 shooting, three assists, and two steals. Brook Lopez had 18/11/4 for the Nets, who were led by Devin Harris's efficient 21 (11 shots), followed closely by CDR's inefficient 20 (20 shots). DJ Mbenga got seven minutes for the Lakers and Adam Morrison shot 2-3, but poor Eduardo Najera couldn't get off the bench for Jersey.

Thunder 90, Rockets 95: Carl Landry got a rare "DNP Elbow to Mouth". I don't even know what that means. Wouldn't "DNP chipped teeth" or "DNP concussion" or "DNP headache" make more sense? "Elbow to mouth" sounds like some horrifying British disease. It does describe what happened, but it happened in the previous game.

Anyway, Trevor Ariza stepped up in a big way, scoring 31 on 20 shots and adding eight boards and six assists while committing just one turnover. That's the best game of the year for Ariza as far as I can remember. Chuck Hayes had 13/15, including eight offensive boards (his specialty). Kevin Durant got shut down, shooting 6-18, leaving Jeff Green as the Thunder's leading scorer with 21.

Kings 96, Bucks 95: Is that back-to-back last-second one-point losses at home for the Bucks? Tyreke Evans made a layup with under a second to play and Andrew Bogut missed a 12-footer to seal it. Evans had 24 on the game to with seven boards, although he did turn the ball over six times. Jason Thompson had 22/10, and Spencer Hawes celebrated his return to the starting lineup by fouling out. All five Bucks starters scored between 14 and 17 points. Bogut added 13 rebounds and Jennings had nine assists. Michael Redd shot 1-6 off the bench. They could really use him contributing, but he's obviously not all the way back yet.

Pacers 99, Spurs 100: The Spurs needed a 30-16 fourth quarter to squeak this one out over a mediocre (bad, even?) visiting Pacer team, and even required a Tim Duncan dunk with four seconds left followed by a missed TJ Ford jumper. The Spurs were this close to going down in defeat as Roy Hibbert blocked Duncan's attempt just prior to his dunk. TD had 19/16/3/2/3 overall. He got 14 points of support from Keith Bogans, and while Tony Parker had 15, he shot just 4-17. Hibbert, before almost winning the game for Indy, had 20 (one off the team lead) to go with seven boards and six blocks. The Big Stiff indeed.

Wizards 95, Suns 121: That's called getting run out of the gym. Jason Richardson returned to the lineup with 22 points, Steve Nash had 15/7/15, and Amare had 23/14. Goran Dragic didn't take his return to the bench personally, scoring 12. The Wizards were led by Gil Arenas's 22, but he shot 6-21. Nick Young had a nice game, though, with 20 points on nine shots in 28 minutse off the bench. He was the only Wizard, regardless of how many or few shots were taken, to shoot over 50%, though. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1027.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1027 I forgot to do Thursday's games yesterday, so it's a good thing it was a short night, with just three contests.

Thursday

Knicks 89, Bulls 98: The Knicks won the first quarter by eleven, lost that lead, came back to be up two with 7:05 to play, and were outscored 21-10 from there. Luol Deng had a huge game for the Bulls with 24/13/5 and John Salmons added 20/7/4 of his own. Taj Gibson put in a double-double off the bench with 12/10. The teams grabbed the same number of offensive rebounds despite the Knicks putting up twelve more chance on their offensive glass (49 total rebounds on the Knicks' offensive side; 37 on the Bulls' side). The Knicks did win the turnover battle by committing just nine gaffes, but they outfouled the home team 22-12. The big number, though, is that the Knicks shot themselves into the game and they shot themselves out. They took 47 threes, 15 by Big Cock, 13 by Al Harrington, 10 by Chris Duhon, and six by Wilson Chandler. They shot an ok percentage (34%), led by Duhon's 5-10 effort, and if your approach is "from deep or at the bucket", then great, but the Knicks had just 24 paint points and 12 free throws, and they shot 36% overall, barely better than their 34% three-point mark.

The Knicks went with an even shorter rotation than usual, as just six players got more than four minutes. Eddy Curry and Toney Douglas each played four, leaving Cock as the only reserve to actually have an impact. Jonathan Bender, by the way, is active for the Knicks, which is interesting.

Magic 86, Heat 104: The Magic never looked competitive in this one, losing the first and third quarters by a combined 29 points. The entire fourth quarter was garbage time,s o the 26-15 score there isn't really indicative of anything. Dwyane Wade finally shot a good percentage, hitting 10-17 for 25 points, and Michael Beasley had another good night with 22/8. Wade, Carlos Arroyo, and Mario Chalmers evenly split 20 assists amongst them, while the Magic had just twelve total, on 34 field goals. Dwight Howard had 17/14 with two blocks.

Suns 102, Blazers 105: Portland won the fourth quarter by 14 to take this one, so the Suns have to be disappointed. The Suns were in the lead all the way to the 4:16 mark, when a Brandon Roy free throw tied it. Portland continued their run, opening up as much as a five point lead with 0:33 to play, but Steve Nash hit a three at that point to get the game down to one shot. Martell Webster, though, grabbed an offensive rebound off a Jerryd Bayless miss with 0:11 to go and the Blazers hit enough of their free throws to win. If the Suns manage to get that rebound, maybe things turn out differently. Rebounding wasn't a problem for most of the game for the Suns (26 of 38 on the defensive glass; 10 of 39 on offense), they just couldn't grab that crucial one. Bayless led the Blazers with 29 points in 29 minutes, on 15 shots, helping make up for Brandon Roy's 9-22 shooting night. With Jason Richardson out, Goran Dragic started alongside Nash, but Jared Dudley wound up getting more playing time. Nash had 13 dimes and Amare had 27/11.

Friday

Nets 95, Raptors 118: This wasn't as close as it looks. The Raptors won the first half 70-33 and just coasted home from there. Seven players scored in double digits for Toronto as they shot 59% and hit six of their nine threes. Amir Johnson actually led the team in scoring with 18 in 19 minutes, adding seven boards, two steals, and two blocks. Hedo had 14/4/7 in just 24 minutes and Chris Bosh had 16/8 in 26. The Nets were led by CDR's 16.

Jazz 83, Hawks 96: Another one that wasn't as closed as it looks -- Utah won the fourth by 17 to close the gap to a 13-point loss. The Jazz only managed 18, 16, and 17 points in the first three quarters. The Hawks didn't exactly go off in the first half, either, but they had a solid 10-point lead at the intermission, and then ran up 37 points in the third. Josh Smith did his thing with 16/8/5/5/2 on just nine field goals. Joe Johnson missed his threes but ended up with 12/9/7 anyway. Wes Matthews was the only Jazz starter to crack 10 points, and didn't do it by much, ending up with 11. AK47 wound up with a team-leading 13, but it took him fourteen three-throw attempts to get there (he hit just seven of them). He did have six boards, six dimes, and two blocks, though. Paul Millsap played 17 minutes and hit all four of his shots but grabbed just a single rebound. It's not his worst rebounding performance ever: he did have a 16-minute, zero-rebound game against Dallas in 2008, and he's had one-rebound games of 18 and 19 minutes as well. Still, it's pretty rare.

Sixers 98, Celtics 97: Boston lost the second half by 12, and it was a see-saw game in the fourth quarter, with the biggest lead for either squad being the Celtics' six-point margin with just two minutes gone. From the 6:46 mark on, neither team led by more than two. The game came down to Elton Brand getting a tip-in on the offensive glass to give the Hawks a one-point lead with 0:07 to play before Paul Pierce missed a midrange jumper at the end. (Ray Allen actually got the offensive rebound and threw up a desperation turnaround at the buzzer, but that was a hope and a prayer more than a real shot. Pierce's shot was presumably the designed play.) Pierce shot just 4-12 overall, so the load fell on other guys: KG had an excellent night getting to and hitting from the line (11-11), ending up with 21/10/4/1/4 overall, Kendrick Perkins grabbed sixteen boards, eight offensive, and Rajon Rondo dished ten dimes. Rasheed Wallace got ejected after just nine minutes of run, however, leaving more playing time for the likes of Shelden Williams. Williams acquitted himself well with 3-3 shooting, but didn't grab a single rebound. Allen Iverson missed the game for the Sixers, with Willie Green stepping into the starting spot, leaving Elton Brand in his new role as the sixth man, a role he played well, managing 23 points, eight boards, and the aforementioned game-winning tip-in.

Nuggets 92, Hornets 98: Chris Paul can take all the credit for this win as he went bonkers: 30/9/19 with just four turnovers. That's 20 field goals, three free throws, and nineteen dimes while turning it over four times. His teammates helped him out by committing just five turnovers combined themselves. Peja had 24 and Emeka Okafor grabbed12 boards. Chauncey Billups was out for the Nuggets, leaving Anthony Carter the starting duties. Ty Lawson actually played more minutes, though, and he scored 14, but managed just two assists. JR Smith led the team in scoring with 25 as Carmelo had an off night, hitting 5-16 from the floor. Kenyon Martin grabbed 13 rebounds but shot only 1-4.

Bucks 82, Cavs 85: Milwaukee actually led by two heading into orange slices, but Cleveland stomped them 24-12 in the third quarter before withstanding a run that got the Bucks to the point where a Brandon Jennings three with 0:04 to go could have meant extra time. Instead, he was completely blanketed on defense and missed the shot badly, leaving Cleveland to escape with a narrow victory against a mediocre opponent. LeBron narrowly missed a triple-double with 26/10/8, although he did turn the ball over six times. He only missed seven shots and two free throws, though, so his efficiency overall wasn't terrible. Jennings missed a ton of shots, hitting just 5-21 en route to 18 points. He did have eight assists, though. Ersan Ilyasova tied for the team lead with 18 of his own. Andrew Bogut had eight boards in 17 minutes, but that minute total was low because of his five fouls.

Kings 96, Wolves 112: Minnesota got well-balanced offense, with the entire starting lineup scoring between 12 and 20, although it wasn't a particularly assist-happy game, as they racked up 21 on 47 field goals. Kevin Love was one of the guys with 20, and he added 16 boards and five rebounds for what was probably his best game as a pro (a 23/12/3 performance against Dallas in March coming the closest to challenging this one). Tyreke Evans had an off game, missing eight of his twelve shots and turning the ball over five times. Omri Casspi led thet eam with 21, while Jason Thompson did solid work, ending up with 18/9. Beno Udrih added 18 off the bench.

Clippers 91, Knicks 95: That's a solid home win for the Knicks against a Clipper team that is probably better than they are. David Lee had a big game with 25/11 and Chris Duhon ran up 17/8/10, the closest he's come to a triple-double since he had 15/9/14 last December. (Duhon actually does have one triple-double in his career, an 18/10/12 game in the '06 season.) Big Cock moved into the starting lineup and missed a bunch of shots (5-14), but he did have three steals. Al Harrington, back in the sixth-man role, missed even more shots (3-15). I mentioned Jonathan Bender above, and he actually got run in this one, racking up 14 minutes and ending up with nine points on 2-4 shooting. This is, of course, Bender's first NBA game action since November 5, 2005. The talented high-school draftee actually announced his retirement because of all his injuries, so it's great to see him back. The Clippers? 20/9 from Chris Kaman. There.

Pistons 98, Thunder 109: Rodney Stuckey's 31 weren't enough to stop the Thunder, who had six players in double-digits, including James Harden and Serge Ibaka off the bench, led by Kevin Durant's 27 on 17 shots. Harden also added eight assists in his 26 minutes.

Pacers 94, Grizlies 107: Every starter for the Grizzlies was over 17 (that being Marc Gasol, who added 14 boards and five dimes), led by Z-Bo's 26/16/3 with three blocks. Only Rudy Gay shot worse than 50%, and his line was merely bad (6-16), not horrible. He contributed four steals as well. On the other side, the Pacers were led with 16 apiece by Mike Dunleavy and TJ Ford, while the other three starters combined for 22. Dahntay Jones and Psycho T each had 14 off the bench, but Jones did his on 6-6 shooting, while Hansbrough hoisted thirteen shots, missing four. Hansbrough actually led the team in field-goal attempts (tied with Ford) in just 22 minutes (Ford played only 23 himself). Something tells me he hasn't learned that he's the not the best offensive player on the floor in these NBA games.

Rockets 116, Mavs 108: Dallas was down eight heading into the fourth, but came back to tie it before losing 16-8 in overtime. They did this almost entirely without Dirk, who played just ten minutes after he drove to the basket early in the game and ended up with his elbow in Carl Landry's mouth, resulting in pieces of Landry's teeth being stuck in Dirk's elbow. Is that the grossest thing you've ever read on this blog? It's probably the grossest thing I've ever written, so you're going to have to just nod your head "yes". With each team's best scorer out, Kyle Lowry picked up the slack for Houston with 26/6/10/5/1 off the bench. That's a point guard picking up six boards and a block, yes. Jason Kidd had another patented "just missed a triple double by two points" game with 8/11/10 while JJ Barea led the team in scoring with 23. (Kidd has 23 games in his career in which he's had nine or fewer points while grabbing at least ten boards and dishing at least ten dimes. Pretty remarkable.)

Wizards 118, Warriors 109: This one had all the defense you'd expect right from the start, a 39-31 first quarter. The teams slowed down from there as they never scored more than 29 in a period over the final three, but big offensive numbers were going to result from this game either way. Gilbert Arenas had 25 on just 25 shots to go with 13 assists, which I'm pretty sure is his first "Arenas!" game of the year. Caron Butler added 28/10 of his own and was one of three Wizards to crack 10 rebounds, teaming with Antawn Jamison and Brendan Haywood. Monta Ellis had 30 points, seven dimes, five steals, and eight turnovers for the Warriors, which is pretty much the definition of a Monta Ellis game. Stephen Curry added 27 and managed eight boards despite being approximately the size of my larger cat. Curry's 27 was a career high, marking the second time he's topped 20 in a game. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1026.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1026 I had the joy of spending last night wrapping presents and preparing them for mailing. Luckily, everything I'm mailing is going one place, and I had just received a pair of shoes in a box that turned out to fit what I was sending perfectly. I covered up the cat-scratch marks (they do love cardboard) with tape and off it goes today. I hope it gets there in time. I also hope it doesn't cost $40 to mail it. I did this while the basketball games were on the TV, so I wasn't paying much attention.

I was, however, paying enough attention to ESPN's pregame and halftime shows to notice that Jamal Mashburn looks a lot like D'Angelo Barksdale. (If you have to ask who D'Angelo Barksdale is, never mind. If you have to ask who Jamal Mashburn is, you're reading the wrong blog.) I know one person who's as into The Wire and the NBA as I am (E-Sex, of course), and Bomani Jones and Jemele Hill, whose Twitter feeds I follow, both have serious Wire and NBA credentials, so I posed the thought to the three of them. No response yet from E-Sex or Jemele, but Bomani, at least, agrees with me.

Grizzlies 97, Hawks 110: That's called taking care of business if you're the Hawks. The first quarter actually ended with Memphis up two, but the second and third were taken by a combined +19 for the Hawks, and that was that. Joe Johnson had 26/8/3 in just 29 minutes, Al Horford had a double-double (15/10) and Josh Smith had 14/7 with four blocks. Sam Young led the Grizz with 20 off the bench, and Marc Gasol did his usual work: 6-7 shooting, least FGAs among the starters. Poor guy.

Bobcats 98, Pacers 101: The Bobcats had a chance in this one, but Gerald Wallace missed a tying three with four seconds to go. Then, Dahntay Jones somehow missed both free throws for the Pacers, either of which would have iced the game, giving the Bobcats one more chance, but it appears they did not get a shot off. (The ESPN play by play does not show tenths of a second, so it records the Bobcats having 0:01 to take a three to tie the game, but it was probably less than that.) It was a shame for Wallace because he had a fine game with 29/12 and four steals, but he missed all three of his threes and turned the ball over five times. Those are the things you look at when you lose by a single shot. Troy Murphy had the big game for Indiana with 26 on 10-13 shooting (5-7 from three) with 15 rebounds and zero turnovers. TJ Ford had 13 assists and six turnovers while shooting 5-9.

Raptors 99, Magic 118: Another Raptors game, another huge point total for the opposition. The Magic shot 57%, which I think is about average for the Raptor defense. Rashard Lewis hit five threes, Dwight Howard had 18/14 and eight blocks while taking just seven shots, and Matt Barnes poured in 20 off the bench. Chris Bosh had 20. That's pretty much the highlight for Toronto.

Cavs 108, Sixers 101: LeBron had 36/6/7 and three steals, but the Cavs' minutes played are what jump out at me. James was on the court for 40 minutes, but of his teammates, only Mo Williams cracked thirty, and just barely, as he ended up with 31. The team really has turned into LeBron and a rotating cast of thousands. Nobody else on the team took more than eight shots (Mo), made more than four (Hickson, Varejao), grabbed more than nine boards (Shaq), or had more than four assists (Mo). Delonte led the Greek Chorus with two steals, and four different guys blocked one shot apiece. Of course, the positives aspects of this are twofold: 1. they won the game; 2. outside of LeBron, the team committed just five turnovers, with five guys having one apiece, including multiple guys playing significant minutes without errors (Varejao and Gibson had 29 and 27 minutes with zero TOs). Mo Williams has really not turned into the consistent second banana that the Cavs wanted and Shaq, who should be the third banana, isn't that, either. Further, Shaq's arrival has pushed Ilgauskas from "solid third banana" to "sometime bench contributor".

Anyway, for the Sixers, Thaddeus Young, who I really thought would lose a lot of point-production upon the arrival of Allen Iverson, had 16/10 last night. He seems to be rebounding more than ever (which can probably be explained, at least in part, by his move to the power forward spot, with Elton Brand going to the bench) and his points haven't gone anywhere (except maybe slightly up). Not that it's helping their record any. They still lost, and they're still 6-19. They're going to have a legitimate shot at a top-three pick, it seems.

Jazz 108, Nets 92: Speaking of top-three picks ... Brook Lopez continues to be the highlight of the season for the Nets, with 23/10 this time. Carlos Boozer had 26/10 of his own, and Deron Williams put up 20 with 14 assists and just two turnovers. Another "speaking of": speaking of third bananas. Who's going to do that for the Jazz this year? Mehmet Okur hasn't looked right, and his numbers are terrible. Paul Millsap's an excellent role player, but he's not going to fill up the basket on nights when Deron or Boozer are off. Ronnie Brewer, AK47, Kyle Korver, same. The team actually has a lot of talent, a lot of guys who do a couple things well (Millsap the rebounder, Korver the shooter, Kirilenko the defender), a couple of glue guys who play good defense (Miles, Brewer), and a couple of stars (Boozer, Deron). It's a bit of a mystery why they're only 15-10 and aren't really contenders.

Pistons 87, Hornets 95: Rip Hamilton missed this one with a sore hamstring, leaving the scoring load on Rodney Stuckey, who again didn't really care it all that well: 26 points on 26 shots, five assists, and six turnovers. David West busted out with 32/12 to lead the Hornets and Chris Paul had 16 with 12 dimes. David West did have six turnovers, which isn't great but also isn't horrible given how often it seems like he had the ball. I'm really only mentioning it because I don't like the guy.

Lakers 107, Bucks 106: The Lakers needed overtime for this one, and not just overtime, but a ridiculous turnaround fall away jumper from Kobe as time expired to win it. Kobe shot just under 50% overall and wound up with 39/7/4 on 28 shots, but the turnovers have reared their ugly head again, as he had seven of them last night. Pau got the ball a little more, putting up 15 shots for 26 points. He also had 22 rebounds, four assists, and four blocks, so his frustration about not getting the ball isn't seeping over into the other aspects of his game. (Not that anybody thought it would. Pau's just a different guy than, say, Shaq, who famously said he'd stop guarding the doghouse if they quit giving him bones or something to that effect.) Ron Artest was a box-score non-factor with 10 points and three boards, and who knows who he was guarding. Mbah a Moute, who had five points in 26 minutes? Michael Redd, with 25 on 24 shots? Delfino, no points and five turnovers in 18 minutes? None of those are particularly strong offensive games, so I'll just assume that Ron-Ron played good defense last night. (He was also a team-leading +10 in his time on the floor, so that counts for something.) It's not really clear what happened in this game that made it so close. Ersan Ilyasova had a nice game with 24 points on 18 shots, but, most guys were inefficient: I've mentioned three of them already, and in addition, Bogut had 16 on 16 and Jennings had 11 on 11. The Lakers shot 16 more free throws and made 17 more; they only commited four more turnovers; they outrebounded the Bucks 47-38; they outshot them 47-42. I guess what it comes down to is that Milwaukee made 10-29 from three to L.A.'s 4-16. Neither number is jump-out-at-you high or low, but a six-three difference can make up a lot of ground in foul shots and rebounds. Anyway, the win leaves the Lakers tied with the Celtics for the best record in basketball, each team with 20 wins and four losses.

Clippers 120, Wolves 95: If you get blown out by the Clippers, you've done something wrong. Of course, the fact that the Wolves have done some things wrong won't come as a surprise to anyone. L.A. had three players go over 20 points: Kaman had 23/10, Gordon had 25; and Rasual Butler continued to be an unheralded bench scorer with 21 in 25 minutes on five threes. Minnesota, meanwhile, was led by Kevin Love's 19 (and 12 boards, five offensive). Baron Davis had 13/8/13. He did take 17 shots, but he only turned it over twice, so overall, it was a pretty good game. Marcus Camby added 18 boards, seven offensive. If Camby and Love were going at it on the boards all night, how did they both end up with big offensive-rebound totals?

Mavs 100, Thunder 86: The Thunder are now 12-12, and while they had a good first half, leading by five at intermission, they fell apart in the second, and they just don't look ready to play with the big boys yet. Kevin Durant's shot was off all night, and he ended up 4-18. Jeff Green's a nice player and Russell Westbrook's a pretty good young point and James Harden's a bench scorer, but the team doesn't have the firepower yet to stand up to a bad Durant shooting night. Especially when Westbrook shoots 6-19 and Harden hits 3-9. (Harden's problems were from distance, though, as he hit none of his four threes. He got to the cup relentlessly, shooting nine free throws in just 29 minutes. JJ Barea, Jason Kidd, and Jason Terry aren't known for their defensive prowess, but still, his ability to get wherever he wanted whenever he wanted was pretty alarming.) On the other side, Dirk was unstoppable, shooting 13-18 and adding 7-8 from the line for 35 points and eleven boards. Nobody else had a notable game, but with the Thunder unable to put the ball in the hole, one big night was plenty.

Rockets 101, Nuggets 111: Carmelo went off for 38 despite shooting just 9-23. He got to the line 20 times and made 19 of those, which is the best free-throw game this year, the best since Chris Bosh also hit 19-20 in March. (By best, I mean at least 20 attempts and at least 95% success.) Sorting that list by points is fun -- how did Corey Maggette shoot 19-20 from the line and only score 25 points overall in February, 2007? Trevor Ariza returned with 18 points on 18 shots, including 1-8 from three. David Anderson was the Rockets' Role Player of the Night, with 17/9 on 6-8 shooting in 21 minutes.

Spurs 103, Warriors 91: It's starting to look like Tim Duncan hadn't actually slowed down the last few years because of age so much as because he didn't need to put up the numbers he used to anymore. But with Tony Parker struggling, Richard Jefferson still not looking great, and Manu being unimpactful off the bench, Duncan has gone back to the old Big Fundamental we knew and loved. He racked up 27/15/4/1/4 in this one, all with just two turnovers and no fouls. No fouls! Granted, the Warriors' starting center was Vlad Radmanovic (who shot 0-8) because Mikki Moore, Ronny Turiaf, and Andris Biedrins are all hurt at the same time, but still. The Warriors started a lineup that has to challenge for one of the tiniest ever, with CJ Watson, Monta Ellis, and Stephen Curry all getting starting nods. I don't even know who to list at what position, but I am delighted by the idea of some stat keeper having mark Monta Ellis down as having logged a game at small forward. Ellis had 35 on 31 shots. He only turned the ball over once, though, despite the aforementioned 31 shots in 45 minutes played, along with five assists. That's pretty good, especially for a guy who's had real trouble taking care of the ball.

Wizards 109, Kings 112: This was my first time seeing Tyreke Evans, since I don't want college basketball. He was an entirely different player than I expected. He plays under control, backs guys down, drives to the basket, dishes, plays defense ... and he's big. I think 6'6", as he's listed by ESPN, is a little generous, but I was under the impression that he was going to be like a 6'2", 6'3" guard. He's not that at all. He's strong and athletic, and he uses that athleticism better than any 20-year-old rookie I can think of. He didn't have a "what!" night last night, but the fact that we're already at the point with him where 26 points on 50% shooting, 8-10 from the line, six boards, and six assists is a "pretty good, Tyreke, pretty good" says a lot.

Omri Casspi also looked good. The box score says he only hit 2-8 from three, so it's a good thing I looked at it before writing anything, because I really only remember the two makes. He's very smooth, not that smoothness necessarily correlates with performance (see Dirk, perhaps the least smooth great player in the game). Anyway, despite Arenas and Jamison both going for 30+, the Kings won by a nose on the backs of the aforementioned duo along with Jason Thompson, who had 17/13, including six offensive boards. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1025.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1025 I had to spend an extra hour at work, followed by Christmas shopping last night, so I never got around to writing my NBA roundup for Monday's games. Instead, I watched Paper Heart, a positive adorable movie that I wrote a little about over at The Woj. Anyway, here's two days of NBA in one.

Monday

Pacers 98, Magic 106: Orlando started slow (30-17 first quarter), but finished strong (27-17 fourth quarter) on the back of Dwight Howard, who had a 20/20/20 game: 21 points, 22 free throws (13 made), and 23 rebounds (nine offensive). That's a season-high for the NBA this year. Howard also blocked four shots. It doesn't seem like he's had these kinds of games as often this year as he did in 2009, but maybe that's just my happy memories of his leading my fantasy team to a championship. Vince Carter had 28 points to lead Orlando, and the bench had 49, led by Anthony Johnson and JJ Redick, who also combined for 12 assists. Roy Hibbert was +11 in his time on the floor, but that time was only 15 minutes, as he ended up with five fouls (which goes a long way toward explaining Howard's 22 free throws -- Jeff Foster also had five). TJ Ford had 13/6/7, which if you squint kind of looks like an off night for Rajon Rondo. Tyler Hansbrough jacked up 12 shots in 24 minutes and ended up with eight points. He did have six boards and three assists, though. Active! The man is active.

Warriors 101, Sixers 117: Philly can't score, but one well-known remedy for scoring woes is to play Golden State. Seven guys with 11+ for Philly, with Elton Brand putting in 11 ... off the bench. In 17 minutes. Which he was apparently not happy about, making some kind of comment about how Mikki Moore was a starter in the NBA (he's the starting center for the Warriors these days) but somehow he wasn't. Eddie Jordan shook things up, going small with Jrue Holiday in the backcourt, pushing Andre Iguodala to the small forward. Holiday had 15/7/6 and three steals, so it worked alright for him. Allen Iverson shot 7-10, so it really worked for him. Thaddeus Young had 26/14/4 with three steals of his own, so that was nice. Iggy didn't do much with the change, though, shooting 4-20. He did have eight boards and three steals, though. (Three steals was kind of going around.) Corey Maggette scored 24 off the bench for the Warriors on the strength of 15 free throw attempts. Monta Ellis and Stephen Curry apparently couldn't deal with the defensive stylings of Iverson and Holiday, though, as they combined to shoot 8-27 and turn the ball over seven times. (Maggette had six turnovers of his own, it should be noted.)

Celtics 110, Grizzlies 105: Boston was only up two with 0:42 to play after an OJ Mayo jumper, but Ray Allen nailed a three 25 seconds later, and Rasheed Wallace stole a Z-Bo pass to seal things up. Wallace wound up with 15 points on 15 shots, including 1-6 from three. (By contrast, Ray Allen also shot six threes, but he made by of them.) It's hard to complaint, as a Celtics fan, since the team is 20-4, but Rasheed might well shoot his team right out of a playoff game or two if he does this all year. The big men got no love from the refs, by the way: Kendrick Perkins fouled out, KG picked up five fouls, and even Wallace had four. On the other side, Marc Gasol had five of his own fouls, and Hasheem Thabeet had three in 18 minutes. Z-Bo probably would have had more fouls, but we all know his reputation for physicality. Rudy Gay led Memphis with 23/7, but misssed all five of his threes. (The Grizz hit just one of their thirteen threes overall.)

Hornets 90, Mavs 94: Dallas led this by nine with four to play, but New Orleans closed to two on Darius Songaila buckets at 0:22 and again at 0:13. Dirk made a layup after the first basket and Jason Terry hit his free throws after the second, though. Chris Paul missed a three with seven ticks to go, and that was that. Paul, in fact, missed all four of hit threes, and shot just 9-22 overall, undermining a 20/4/16 line, with five steals to boot. Still, poor shooting or not, 16 assists to one turnover (especially when you create five turnovers of your own) is pretty damn impressive. Songaila hit all six of his shots in just eleven minutes of PT, while David West went back to being David West again: 11/4. That's awful. Dirk only scored ten against his nemesis, but JJ Barea had 23 on 10-13 shooting, and Jason Kidd had 13 assists of his own. Josh Howard had 14/8 off the bench, but five turnovers.

Thunder 93, Nuggets 102: All that stuff about this maybe being the year for Hijack City is looking less and less good, as they're now a 12-11 team. Kevin Durant had 32/10 in this one, and for once his +/- was the best among the starters, albeit still negative (to be expected when you lose, of course). Birdman had 15/11, three blocks, and three steals for the Nuggets, and hit nine of this ten free-throw attempts. That's pretty good for a guy who's at 64% for his career. Carmelo had another 30-point game.

Wolves 110, Jazz 108: I can't get a handle on Utah, and I doubt anyone else can, either. They beat good teams, lose to bad teams. They're 14-10, but two of the ten were to Minnesota? The Wolves got 22+ from Corey Brewer, Al Jefferson (who added 12 boards), and Jonny Flynn, and Kevin Love had fourteen more rebounds. Deron Williams had 38 points and 13 dimes with just one turnover (which is remarkable -- the guy took 20 shots, 18 free throws, and had 13 assists, and he turned the ball over just once? Come on, that's absurd), and Carlos Boozer had 14/14 before fouling out, but they got beat on the glass (Minnesota took 34 of 41 on defense and 14 of 43 on offense) and gave up a go-ahead layup with three seconds to go to Jonny Flynn.

Wizards 95, Clippers 97: Another close one! Antawn Jamison's 32/11 wasn't enough to overcome Gilbert Arenas's poor game (4-14 shooting, 1-7 from three, six turnovers, fouled out in 34 minutes), despite 12 team steals and a four-block game by Brendan Haywood. Chris Kaman had 23/11, Baron Davis couldn't hit a shot (2-14), but had twelve assists, and Eric Gordon went off (10-15) for 29, tying his season-high.

Tuesday

Nets 89, Cavs 99: Brook Lopez! 22/15. Rafer Alston! 20 off the bench. Final score! Lose by ten. LeBron had an understated game with 23/6/7 and six turnovers, but Shaq and Big Z had identical 7-9 shooting nights, for 16 points apiece (they each made two free throws, although Shaq took six attempts to Z's three). Both also had five boards, a steal, and three blocks. Shaq out-assisted Z by 2-1. That's a pretty awesome center combination, though, not just because of the identicality, but because you get yourself 47 minutes of pivot play that results in 32 points on 18 shots, ten boards, three assists, and six blocks. With just three turnovers and five fouls? And the opposing center shoots 6-17? Fine job, gentlemen, fine job.

Knicks 87, Bobcats 94: The Knicks led by eight going into the fourth, had a six-point lead with 4:00 to play, and had some lead all the way until the 1:57 mark, when Flip Murray completed the Bobcat comeback with a three on a Boris Diaw assist. From there, Ray Felton hit two layups, Stephen Jackson dunked +1, and Felton hit two free throws to ice it. From the 3:57 point until the end of the game, the Knicks got exactly one basket, a Wilson Chandler layup. Not pretty. Stephen Jackson wound up with 24 (but on 22 shots, and with five turnovers), Felton had 18 (six assists, five turnovers), and Gerald Wallace made his usual multifaceted contributions with 21/8/5 and four steals. I wonder if this Bobcats team is any fun to watch. Stephen Jackson, Gerald Wallace, and Boris Diaw, with Tyson Chandler catching an occasional lob at center and Ray Felton running a solid point, has to be fun, right? Somehow, I bet Larry Brown kills any joy the team might bring. Big Cock missed all his threes for the Knicks, and Jared Jeffries had six steals, but fouled out. Chris Duhon led the team in scoring, which is not a phrase you want to hear me utter.

Raptors 95, Heat 115: Chris Bosh had 28 on 13 shots, but a bunch of Ratpors shot for shit in this one: 3-11 from Hedo, 2-9 from DeMar DeRozan (still shaking off the effects of almost getting knocked the eff out by Trevor Ariza?), and 0-7 from Marco Belinelli were the lowlights. Also, Bosh was kept off the boards in a big way, as he had just two rebounds. Two boards in 31 minutes? You know what that means. Basketball-Reference Play Index! I searched Chris Bosh's history for 30+-minute games with two or fewer rebounds. I found four games in his career. This wasn't his low, as he had a one-rebound game in 35 minutes against Washington in the '07 season. His two other two-board games both came in the '04 season. In other words, this was a pretty rare feat accomplished by Miami.

The Heat dominated the boards in general, getting 33 of 37 available boards on defense and grabbing 12 of 40 on offense. Michael Beasley led the team with 11 (and also led the team in scoring with 28 -- that's precisely the kind of game Heat fans have been waiting on), but Haslem, Wright, and Anthony contributed a combined 21 in 64 minutes off the bench as well. Carlos Arroyo moved into the starting lineup, but Mario Chalmers actually played more minutes (27 to 21) and had eight dimes while missing all four of his threes. Neither one could do much for Dwyane Wade, who shot 8-19. Wade only played 29 minutes because he sat the entire fourth quarter. (This may have had something to do with Beasley leading the team in scoring, since he played 36 and thus was presumably the main offensive option during garbage time.)

Lakers 96, Bulls 87: Not the most impressive final score by LA, but a road win is a road win. The Celtics were the "first team" to twenty wins, but Boston and L.A. have the same number of losses, so if LA gets a win in their next contest, they'll be on even footing. Anyway, this game: Kobe shot the ball 26 times and had eight turnovers, which is sort of vintage Kobe, but he did end up with 42 points, so his efficiency actually wasn't bad. This was good, because Ron Artest was awful on offense, shooting 3-14 (but with zero turnovers in 45 minutes) and the Lakers got destroyed on the glass: Andrew Bynum had just three boards, Joakim Noah had 20, and the Bulls grabbed 22 of 53 rebounds on their offensive glass while permitting the Lakers just 6 of 35 on the other end. Pau got 16 boards, but he only managed eight shots and four free throws, so the Lakers continue to fail to get him the ball. It is beyond me why L.A. is struggling so much with this facet of the game. Anyway, I mentioned Noah's 20 boards, but I didn't mention yet that 14 of them were offensive. He may have been cleaning up his own garbage, though, as he shot just 4-16. Either way, it's the best offensive rebounding game since Shaq's 14 in 2003. The last guy to top 14 was, of course, Dennis Rodman (who else?), who had 15 two days before Christmas in 1997. (Weirdly, Jayson Williams had 14 of his own two days after Christmas in 1997. Big holiday for offensive rebounding.)

Pistons 96, Rockets 107: Chase Budinger got the start for Trevor Ariza, out with a forearm (a forearm aimed at DeMar DeRozan's head, that is). He made the best of it with a 16/12/5 game. He missed four of five from three, but shot 5-6 otherwise and hit his three free throws. The kid really can play. Aaron Brooks also had a nice game with 23 points and 10 dimes despite also missing a bunch of threes: 0-6, in fact. The Pistons were led by the mighty backcourt of Rip 'n' Stuck, who combined for 38 points on 46 shots. Ouch. (Still, admit it, you like "Rip 'n' Stuck" -- it's a good nickname.)

Spurs 104, Suns 116: Tim Duncan went all vintage for a night with 34/14 and three blocks, but the rest of the team shot 26-64. That includes Roger Mason's solid 7-13 night (5-8 from three), so if you take him out, too, you're down to 19-51, which is not good. Amare pretty much matched Duncan with 28/14 of his own -- no blocks, but three steals, which are better since you get the ball, not a guarantee with a block. Nash added 25 and 13 dimes and Goran Dragic finally had a good game, shooting 4-5 from three en route to 18 points in 25 minutes.

Kings 88, Blazers 95: Portland may be a walking MASH unit, but they've still got enough to beat the Martin-less Kings. Tyreke Evans scored an efficient 19 to lead Sacramento, and Beno Udrih continued to pour it in off the bench with 17, but LaMarcus Aldridge and Brandon Roy each had 25 (Roy adding ten dimes and Aldrige grabbing nine boards) to lead the way. jasonw@beaneball.org (Jason Wojciechowski)http://beaneball.org/1024.htmlhttp://beaneball.org/1024 Nico at Athletics Nation puts together a possible lineup for 2010 after the Michael Taylor trade. He assumes that Brandon Inge could be acquired in a trade involving Scott Hairston or Travis Buck, but I don't think that's necessary or even a good idea. Instead, here's what the lineup looks like to me, built from the parts that are already on the team.

C: Kurt Suzuki's the everyday guy and Landon Powell is a perfectly adequate backup.

1B: I'd give Daric Barton one last crack at the job. If he can't handle it, then Jake Fox will start getting a lot of time there, and Chris Carter can come up midseason, and Dallas McPherson can get a look as well.

2B: Mark Ellis

SS: Aaron Pennington

3B: Eric Chavez gets a chance first. If that doesn't work out, that's what Dallas McPherson was signed for. And then beyond that, you've got Jake Fox. Worst comes to worst, there's Aaron Miles.

LF: If he's ready, Michael Taylor. If he's not, Scott Hairston.

CF: This is the part that won't happen, but Ryan Sweeney should play here. His defensive numbers, both in right and center, are off the charts per UZR. And his bat, while still not stellar, may be slightly above-average in center. Anyway, Sweeney would only play center if Taylor is in left. If Hairston is in left, then Rajai Davis enters the lineup, and he'll play center, pushing Sweeney to right. But if Taylor is in left, then Hairston would go to:

RF: Scott Hairston. Look, Rajai Davis is not a starting outfielder. He had a batting-average-driven career year with the bat, and his defensive numbers shot up as well. I think both will regress. His defense won't regress to the point where he's not a plus outfielder, but I think carrying his bat will be very difficult to justify. Thus, Rajai takes his old spot as an injury replacement and late-innings pinch-runner (for Barton, Fox, Chavez, or Powell), and on defense, he can come in and play center, pushing Sweeney to right and Hairston to left. (Unless Michael Taylor is a defensive stud, in which case Hairston gets to be the one taking a seat.) That's a stellar defensive outfield, the kind that could allow Billy Beane to have a few guys in his bullpen that give up some fly balls now and again, especially in Oakland, where those fly balls just don't leave the yard.

DH: In an ideal world, where Barton and Chavez are healthy and productive, this spot belongs to Jake Fox. In the non-ideal world the A's are sure to live in, the spot will get rotated around with Fox, Carter, Chavez, McPherson, Travis Buck, Tommy Everidge, and Hairston all getting time. As long as Aaron Miles is never the DH, the A's will be ok.