It’s been a rough couple days for A’s GM Billy Beane. Following his team’s 9-8 loss to the Royals on Tuesday night, his overall philosophy has once again been called into question, as well as his team’s inability to advance in the playoffs the last decade+.
Billy Beane says playoffs r crapshoot Mainly agree. But 1-13 last 14 elimination gms When does that stop being small sample size #Athletics
— Joel Sherman (@Joelsherman1) October 1, 2014
It always makes me uncomfortable whenever I see a non-rhetorical question framed rhetorically, as is the case with Joel Sherman’s question above. Had the A’s won, we can assume he would not have asked it, and since a single baseball game between two playoff teams is nearly a crapshoot bound by randomness, I cannot think of anything Billy Beane could have done differently.
Now that his team’s season is over without a win to show for it in the playoffs, Beane was asked on Wednesday his thoughts on his deadline trade of Yoenis Céspedes to the Red Sox for Jon Lester.
“Simply put, if we don’t have Jon Lester, I don’t think we make the playoffs.”
It’s tough to argue with that statement considering the A’s held off the Mariners by only 1 game for the last playoff spot and went 7-4 in games started by Lester after he was acquired while 15-29 in non-Lester starts. The arguments for and against Billy Beane’s roster-construction will always be framed around saber versus non-saber, but this year he put his team in a position to advance to the ALDS and they had a lead in extra innings in the play-in game. Losing that game was simply bad luck.
