No, okay, I'm doing A Thing, but Stephen Vogt knows a lot more about pitching that any of us ever will, and if he's talking up Cotton, well, that presumably means ... okay, actually, what it means is he's a good teammate who always has a good word to say about a fellow Athletic.

In any event, Cotton is one of the players I'm legitimately excited about for this season. Things aren't going to go well for the A's this year, and I don't think any of us have any illusions about this. So here, for what it's worth, is my list of Little Optimisms:

• Jharel Cotton, just generally
• Rajai Davis stealing bases
• Stephen Vogt hitting topspin singles
• Marcus Semien's all-around competence
• Josh Phegley's occasional starts
• Sean Manaea, just generally
• Sean Doolittle, just generally, and on Twitter
• Ryan Dull, just generally
• Franklin Barreto's July callup
• Matt Olson's injury fill-in performance that requires the A's to think very hard about whether they want to keep Yonder Alonso around

The sore-thumb name from the list is Sonny Gray. The problem is that I'm not actually optimistic. I'm anxious as all hell. I'm worried that something is deeply wrong, that last year wasn't a fluke, that it's all over for him, that the cornerstone is actually a depressing millstone. I don't want any of this to be true but it's sure going to make my poor tum tum hurt for at least the first two months, unless he proves he's back to being the Sonny Gray we all thought he was before 2016.